The Politics of the Environment: Ideas, Activism, Policy, 2nd Edition

ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY

7.1 The Tragedy of the Commons

The idea of the ‘Tragedy of the Commons’ was

popularised by Garrett Hardin. He invites us to

picture a medieval village pasture that is open

to all and to assume that each peasant will try

to keep as many cattle as possible on this land.

Eventually, the carrying capacity of the land will

be reached. However, when confronted with a

decision about whether or not to put an extra

cow on the common land, the rational

self-interested peasant will recognise that,

whilst all the benefits of the extra cow accrue to

her or him alone, the costs – the effects of

overgrazing – will be shared with the other

villagers. Thus each villager will keep adding

more cows until the common land is destroyed:

Therein is the tragedy. Each man is locked into a

system that compels him to increase his herd

without limit – in a world that is limited. Ruin is the

destination toward which all men rush, each

pursuing his own best interest in a society that

believes in the freedom of the commons.

Freedom in a commons brings ruin to all.

(Hardin 1968 :1244)

Hardin uses the common land of a medieval

village as a metaphor for contemporary

environmental problems to show how private

benefit and public interest seem to point in

opposite directions because individually

rational actions may produce collectively

irrational outcomes.

This metaphor can be used to analyse

contemporary problems such as over-fishing

and deforestation. Ostrom et al. ( 1999 ) argue

7. 1The Tragedy of the Commons

‘are real, but not inevitable’ (p. 281). See

Ostrom ( 1990 ) for a critical discussion of

common-property issues.

public goods. The problem here is not about the consumption of air, but how

individuals use this resource to dispose of waste materials such as sulphur

dioxide or carbon dioxide. The collective challenge posed by common-sink

resources is to control their level of pollution (Weale 1992 :192–3). Failure to

protect either pools or sinks can lead to a ‘tragedy of the commons’ (Box7. 1)

in which a resource is either completely exhausted or damaged beyond use.

◗ Transboundary problems

Problems of the global commons are frequently transboundary: for exam-

ple, climate change, ozone depletion and marine pollution do not respect

national borders. Global problems represent a major threat to the environ-

ment and can only be solved through concerted action by the international

community. However, if one nation takes action to reduce ozone depletion

or prevent global warming, it cannot exclude other nations from the ben-

efits. Whereas an individual government can use the law of the land to

require citizens or companies to change their behaviour, the doctrine of

national sovereignty means that there is no equivalent international author-

ity – no world government – that can force every country to conform. Con-

sequently, as Chapter9 shows, efforts by the international community to

address transboundary problems have required unprecedented levels of co-

operation between states and the building of new international institutions

topersuade reluctant nations to support joint action.