Tragedy of the commons
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The tragedy of the commons is a term, originally used by
Garrett Hardin, to denote
a situation where individuals acting independently and rationally according to each's self-interest behave contrary to the best interests of the whole group by depleting some common resource. The term is taken from the title of an article written by Hardin in 1968, which is in turn based upon an essay by a Victorian economist on the effects of unregulated grazing on
common land.
"
Commons" in this sense has come to mean such resources as
atmosphere,
oceans, rivers,
fish stocks, the office refrigerator, energy or any other shared resource which is not formally regulated, not common land in its agricultural sense.
The tragedy of the commons concept is often cited in connection with
sustainable development, meshing economic growth and environmental protection, as well as in the
debate over global warming. It has also been used in analyzing behavior in the fields of
economics,
evolutionary psychology,
anthropology,
game theory,
politics,
taxation, and
sociology. However the concept, as originally developed, has also received criticism for not taking into account the many other factors operating to enforce or agree on regulation in this scenario.