Question

In one paragraph, provide an explanation of this paper of “tragedy of the commons” for someone who has never read it.

Answer 1

Tragedy of commons was introduced by Garette Hardin in 1968.In Hardin's  "The Tragedy of the Commons," a commons is a natural resource shared by many individuals. In this context, "shared" means that each individual does not have a claim to any part of the resource, but rather, to the use of a portion of it for his/her own benefit.The tragedy is that, in the absence of regulation, each individual will have a tendency to exploit the commons to his/her own advantage, typically without limit. Under this state of affairs, the commons is depleted and eventually ruined.And the root cause for this tragedy is the unrestrained sel interest of some people.For instance, the air no group or country can claim exclusive ownership of it.The excessive pumping of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere by some countries adversely affect atmosphere causing global warming.Societies that want to remain sustainable have no choice but to regulate the use of the commons. Regulation is the price to pay for sustainability; it is the least undesirable strategy, since an unregulated commons eventually marches itself toward tragedy.