Concepts
Tragedy of the Commons
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The tragedy of the commons describes a situation in which individuals acting in their own rational self-interest deplete a shared resource, even though this outcome works against the long-term interest of the whole group. The term was popularized by the ecologist Garrett Hardin in a 1968 essay arguing that a shared pasture open to every herder would inevitably be overgrazed, because each herder captures the full benefit of adding one more animal while the cost of overgrazing is spread across everyone. Hardin's own prescriptive conclusion, that only privatizing the resource or imposing centralized government control could prevent this outcome, is contested. Elinor Ostrom's empirical research, recognized by the 2009 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, showed that communities frequently design and enforce their own durable rules for sustainable collective management, without either solution.
The underlying dynamic Hardin described, that an open access resource tends toward overuse absent some constraint, is widely accepted; what remains debated is his narrower prescriptive claim that only privatization or state control can supply that constraint, a claim Ostrom's fieldwork challenged directly.
Facts
Cross-Tradition Connections
Critiqued Here
Elinor Ostrom, Economists Ostrom's fieldwork and her Nobel-winning Governing the Commons (1990) showed that communities can craft their own durable rules to manage shared resources sustainably, through monitoring and mutual enforcement, without requiring either privatization or top down government control, challenging Garrett Hardin's 1968 conclusion that only those two solutions could prevent overuse.
Associated With
Externalities, Concepts Overuse of a shared resource, the scenario Garrett Hardin described as the tragedy of the commons, is a classic negative externality: each user's consumption imposes uncompensated costs on every other user of the same resource.
The Commons, Concepts Same subject, shared resources without individual ownership, addressed by two different bodies of work: Hardin's 1968 thesis predicts their inevitable overuse absent privatization or state control; Ostrom's empirical research (Governing the Commons, 1990) documents communities that avoid it through self-designed, durable governance institutions.
Associated With School
Sources
1. The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics
Palgrave Macmillan
1. The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics
Palgrave MacmillanCommons, tragedy of the
2. Wikipedia
2. Wikipedia
Wikimedia FoundationLead sectionQuote, Lead section
Freedom in a commons brings ruin to all.
2. Wikipedia
Wikimedia FoundationAssociated With: Elinor Ostrom, Elinor OstromView the Source Governing the Commons
Elinor Ostrom, Cambridge University Press, 1990Associated With: The Commons
Governing the Commons
Elinor Ostrom, Cambridge University Press, 1990Associated With: Elinor Ostrom, Chapter 3Quote, Associated With: Elinor Ostrom, Chapter 3
Ostrom's Governing the Commons shows communities frequently design and enforce their own durable rules for sustainable collective management, without either privatization or central control.
Governing the Commons
Elinor Ostrom, Cambridge University Press, 1990Associated With School: Ecological Economics, Chapter 1Quote, Associated With School: Ecological Economics, Chapter 1
The commons problem is a founding concern of ecological economics.
Dissenting Readings (1 dissenting reading)
Description
Hardin's own prescription, that only privatization or centralized government control can prevent overuse of a shared resource, does not hold up empirically. Communities managing real fisheries, irrigation systems and forests have repeatedly designed and enforced their own durable rules for sustainable collective management, without either solution.
A dissenting reading, from Elinor OstromElinor Ostrom, Governing the Commons, Cambridge University Press, 1990
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