Free Post # 6: The Tragedy of the Commons

The Tragedy of the commons is a big environmental issue that leads many farms into overshoot, and having overgrazed land that is no longer sufficient.

The commons include things such as grass, water, crop fields, and the air. The tragedy is when we over use these recourses, a lot of the time due to greed, need for safety, and competition. This ends up leading to social disaster. We have a sense of uncertainity when it comes to being set for the future. So lots of farmers plant more than they need or put more animals on their farm so they can feel secure, in their needs and profits. Although this is what leads to the tragedy. They put to much out and go into overshoot, ruining the commons.

We tried this out ourselves in a mock up example in my ESA 200 class to see how it works. We were put into teams of 6, which consisted of 3 families of 2 people. All 3 families had to share a certain amount of land, in this case sticky notes. Each sticky note stood for one acre of grass. To survive  each family needed to obtain 8 cows at the end of four rounds. One cow took up one acre of grass. At the end of each round for very 4 sticky notes that did not have a cow on them you got an additional sticky note for the "commons".

We were given slips of paper( and went in order family a-c ) each round that told us what we could do. Team A always got a big amount of cows they could put on. They could chose to put all of them on or less. In my group we were not aloud to talk to make the simulation seem more realistic. Team A always put on all of their cows. They did so because they felt uncertain not knowing how many cows they may be aloud to put on next round. That uncertainty made them take up a lot of sticky note, leaving less of the commons for the others. Team B got more than 8 cows by the end as well and in fear of uncertainty put all their cows on each round too. Team C got exactly 8 cows by the end. Although they died because we ran out of sticky notes by their last turn, meaning we went into overshoot. There was no room for their last cow.

This is the sad tragedy of the commons that occurs all the time in our world. This simulation was close to what happens in real life. Many farms and fisheries go into overshoot, and over graze their land. They waste the commons that should be there for everyone. Now they are not and they keep dwindling.