The Tragedy of the Commons What Shall We Maximize?

The Tragedy of the CommonsGarrett Hardin (1968)"The Tragedy of the Commons," Garrett Hardin, Science, 162(1968):1243-1248.At the end of a thoughtful article on the future ofnuclear war, J.B. Wiesner and H.F. Yorkconcluded that: "Both sides in the arms raceare…confronted by the dilemma of steadilyincreasing military power and steadily decreasingnational security. It is our consideredprofessional judgment that this dilemma has notechnical solution. If the great powers continue tolook for solutions in the area of science andtechnology only, the result will be to worsen thesituation.'' [1]I would like to focus your attention not on thesubject of the article (national security in anuclear world) but on the kind of conclusion theyreached, namely that there is no technicalsolution to the problem. An implicit and almostuniversal assumption of discussions published inprofessional and semi-popular scientific journalsis that the problem under discussion has atechnical solution. A technical solution may bedefined as one that requires a change only in thetechniques of the natural sciences, demandinglittle or nothing in the way of change in humanvalues or ideas of morality.In our day (though not in earlier times) technicalsolutions are always welcome. Because ofprevious failures in prophecy, it takes courage toassert that a desired technical solution is notpossible. Wiesner and York exhibited thiscourage; publishing in a science journal, theyinsisted that the solution to the problem was notto be found in the natural sciences. Theycautiously qualified their statement with thephrase, "It is our considered professionaljudgment...." Whether they were right or not isnot the concern of the present article. Rather, theconcern here is with the important concept of aclass of human problems which can be called "notechnical solution problems," and morespecifically, with the identification and discussionof one of these.It is easy to show that the class is not a nullclass. Recall the game of tick-tack-toe. Considerthe problem, "How can I win the game of ticktack-toe?"It is well known that I cannot, if Iassume (in keeping with the conventions ofgame theory) that my opponent understands thegame perfectly. Put another way, there is no"technical solution" to the problem. I can win onlyby giving a radical meaning to the word "win." Ican hit my opponent over the head; or I canfalsify the records. Every way in which I "win"involves, in some sense, an abandonment of thegame, as we intuitively understand it. (I can also,of course, openly abandon the game -- refuse toplay it. This is what most adults do.)The class of "no technical solution problems" hasmembers. My thesis is that the "populationproblem," as conventionally conceived, is amember of this class. How it is conventionallyconceived needs some comment. It is fair to saythat most people who anguish over thepopulation problem are trying to find a way toavoid the evils of overpopulation withoutrelinquishing any of the privileges they nowenjoy. They think that farming the seas ordeveloping new strains of wheat will solve theproblem -- technologically. I try to show here thatthe solution they seek cannot be found. Thepopulation problem cannot be solved in atechnical way, any more than can the problem ofwinning the game of tick-tack-toe.What Shall We Maximize?Population, as Malthus said, naturally tends togrow "geometrically," or, as we would now say,exponentially. In a finite world this means that theper-capita share of the world's goods mustdecrease. Is ours a finite world?A fair defense can be put forward for the viewthat the world is infinite or that we do not knowthat it is not. But, in terms of the practical

problems that we must face in the next fewgenerations with the foreseeable technology, it isclear that we will greatly increase human miseryif we do not, during the immediate future,assume that the world available to the terrestrialhuman population is finite. "Space" is no escape.[2]A finite world can support only a finite population;therefore, population growth must eventuallyequal zero. (The case of perpetual widefluctuations above and below zero is a trivialvariant that need not be discussed.) When thiscondition is met, what will be the situation ofmankind? Specifically, can Bentham's goal of"the greatest good for the greatest number" berealized?No -- for two reasons, each sufficient by itself.The first is a theoretical one. It is notmathematically possible to maximize for two (ormore) variables at the same time. This wasclearly stated by von Neumann and Morgenstern,[3] but the principle is implicit in the theory ofpartial differential equations, dating back at leastto D'Alembert (1717-1783).The second reason springs directly frombiological facts. To live, any organism must havea source of energy (for example, food). Thisenergy is utilized for two purposes: meremaintenance and work. For man maintenance oflife requires about 1600 kilocalories a day("maintenance calories"). Anything that he doesover and above merely staying alive will bedefined as work, and is supported by "workcalories" which he takes in. Work calories areused not only for what we call work in commonspeech; they are also required for all forms ofenjoyment, from swimming and automobileracing to playing music and writing poetry. If ourgoal is to maximize population it is obvious whatwe must do: We must make the work calories perperson approach as close to zero as possible.No gourmet meals, no vacations, no sports, nomusic, no literature, no art…I think that everyonewill grant, without argument or proof, thatmaximizing population does not maximize goods.Bentham's goal is impossible.In reaching this conclusion I have made theusual assumption that it is the acquisition ofenergy that is the problem. The appearance ofatomic energy has led some to question thisassumption. However, given an infinite source ofenergy, population growth still produces aninescapable problem. The problem of theacquisition of energy is replaced by the problemof its dissipation, as J. H. Fremlin has so wittilyshown. [4] The arithmetic signs in the analysisare, as it were, reversed; but Bentham's goal isunobtainable.The optimum population is, then, less than themaximum. The difficulty of defining the optimumis enormous; so far as I know, no one hasseriously tackled this problem. Reaching anacceptable and stable solution will surely requiremore than one generation of hard analytical work-- and much persuasion.We want the maximum good per person; butwhat is good? To one person it is wilderness, toanother it is ski lodges for thousands. To one it isestuaries to nourish ducks for hunters to shoot;to another it is factory land. Comparing one goodwith another is, we usually say, impossiblebecause goods are incommensurable.Incommensurables cannot be compared.Theoretically this may be true; but in real lifeincommensurables are commensurable. Only acriterion of judgment and a system of weightingare needed. In nature the criterion is survival. Is itbetter for a species to be small and hideable, orlarge and powerful? Natural selectioncommensurates the incommensurables. Thecompromise achieved depends on a naturalweighting of the values of the variables.Man must imitate this process. There is no doubtthat in fact he already does, but unconsciously. Itis when the hidden decisions are made explicitthat the arguments begin. The problem for theyears ahead is to work out an acceptable theoryof weighting. Synergistic effects, nonlinearvariation, and difficulties in discounting the futuremake the intellectual problem difficult, but not (inprinciple) insoluble.Has any cultural group solved this practicalproblem at the present time, even on an intuitivelevel? One simple fact proves that none has:there is no prosperous population in the world

today that has, and has had for some time, agrowth rate of zero. Any people that hasintuitively identified its optimum point will soonreach it, after which its growth rate becomes andremains zero.Of course, a positive growth rate might be takenas evidence that a population is below itsoptimum. However, by any reasonablestandards, the most rapidly growing populationson earth today are (in general) the mostmiserable. This association (which need not beinvariable) casts doubt on the optimisticassumption that the positive growth rate of apopulation is evidence that it has yet to reach itsoptimum.We can make little progress in working towardoptimum population size until we explicitlyexorcise the spirit of Adam Smith in the field ofpractical demography. In economic affairs, TheWealth of Nations (1776) popularized the"invisible hand," the idea that an individual who"intends only his own gain," is, as it were, "led byan invisible hand to promote…the publicinterest." [5] Adam Smith did not assert that thiswas invariably true, and perhaps neither did anyof his followers. But he contributed to a dominanttendency of thought that has ever sinceinterfered with positive action based on rationalanalysis, namely, the tendency to assume thatdecisions reached individually will, in fact, be thebest decisions for an entire society. If thisassumption is correct it justifies the continuanceof our present policy of laissez faire inreproduction. If it is correct we can assume thatmen will control their individual fecundity so as toproduce the optimum population. If theassumption is not correct, we need to reexamineour individual freedoms to see which ones aredefensible.Tragedy of Freedom in aCommonsThe rebuttal to the invisible hand in populationcontrol is to be found in a scenario first sketchedin a little-known Pamphlet in 1833 by amathematical amateur named William ForsterLloyd (1794-1852). [6] We may well call it "thetragedy of the commons," using the word"tragedy" as the philosopher Whitehead used it[7]: "The essence of dramatic tragedy is notunhappiness. It resides in the solemnity of theremorseless working of things." He then goes onto say, "This inevitableness of destiny can onlybe illustrated in terms of human life by incidentswhich in fact involve unhappiness. For it is onlyby them that the futility of escape can be madeevident in the drama."The tragedy of the commons develops in thisway. Picture a pasture open to all. It is to beexpected that each herdsman will try to keep asmany cattle as possible on the commons. Suchan arrangement may work reasonablysatisfactorily for centuries because tribal wars,poaching, and disease keep the numbers of bothman and beast well below the carrying capacityof the land. Finally, however, comes the day ofreckoning, that is, the day when the long-desiredgoal of social stability becomes a reality. At thispoint, the inherent logic of the commonsremorselessly generates tragedy.As a rational being, each herdsman seeks tomaximize his gain. Explicitly or implicitly, more orless consciously, he asks, "What is the utility tome of adding one more animal to my herd?" Thisutility has one negative and one positivecomponent.1. The positive component is a function of theincrement of one animal. Since the herdsmanreceives all the proceeds from the sale of theadditional animal, the positive utility is nearly + 1.2. The negative component is a function of theadditional overgrazing created by one moreanimal. Since, however, the effects ofovergrazing are shared by all the herdsmen, thenegative utility for any particular decision-makingherdsman is only a fraction of - 1.Adding together the component partial utilities,the rational herdsman concludes that the onlysensible course for him to pursue is to addanother animal to his herd. And another.... Butthis is the conclusion reached by each and everyrational herdsman sharing a commons. Thereinis the tragedy. Each man is locked into a systemthat compels him to increase his herd withoutlimit -- in a world that is limited. Ruin is thedestination toward which all men rush, each

pursuing his own best interest in a society thatbelieves in the freedom of the commons.Freedom in a commons brings ruin to all.Some would say that this is a platitude. Wouldthat it were! In a sense, it was learned thousandsof years ago, but natural selection favors theforces of psychological denial. [8] The individualbenefits as an individual from his ability to denythe truth even though society as a whole, ofwhich he is a part, suffers. Education cancounteract the natural tendency to do the wrongthing, but the inexorable succession ofgenerations requires that the basis for thisknowledge be constantly refreshed.A simple incident that occurred a few years agoin Leominster, Massachusetts shows howperishable the knowledge is. During theChristmas shopping season the parking metersdowntown were covered with plastic bags thatbore tags reading: "Do not open until afterChristmas. Free parking courtesy of the mayorand city council." In other words, facing theprospect of an increased demand for alreadyscarce space, the city fathers reinstituted thesystem of the commons. (Cynically, we suspectthat they gained more votes than they lost by thisretrogressive act.)In an approximate way, the logic of the commonshas been understood for a long time, perhapssince the discovery of agriculture or the inventionof private property in real estate. But it isunderstood mostly only in special cases whichare not sufficiently generalized. Even at this latedate, cattlemen leasing national land on theWestern ranges demonstrate no more than anambivalent understanding, in constantlypressuring federal authorities to increase thehead count to the point where overgrazingproduces erosion and weed-dominance.Likewise, the oceans of the world continue tosuffer from the survival of the philosophy of thecommons. Maritime nations still respondautomatically to the shibboleth of the "freedom ofthe seas." Professing to believe in the"inexhaustible resources of the oceans," theybring species after species of fish and whalescloser to extinction. [9]The National Parks present another instance ofthe working out of the tragedy of the commons.At present, they are open to all, without limit. Theparks themselves are limited in extent -- there isonly one Yosemite Valley -- whereas populationseems to grow without limit. The values thatvisitors seek in the parks are steadily eroded.Plainly, we must soon cease to treat the parks ascommons or they will be of no value to anyone.What shall we do? We have several options. Wemight sell them off as private property. We mightkeep them as public property, but allocate theright to enter them. The allocation might be onthe basis of wealth, by the use of an auctionsystem. It might be on the basis of merit, asdefined by some agreed upon standards. It mightbe by lottery. Or it might be on a first-come, firstservedbasis, administered to long queues.These, I think, are all objectionable. But we mustchoose -- or acquiesce in the destruction of thecommons that we call our National Parks.PollutionIn a reverse way, the tragedy of the commonsreappears in problems of pollution. Here it is nota question of taking something out of thecommons, but of putting something in -- sewage,or chemical, radioactive, and heat wastes intowater; noxious and dangerous fumes into the air;and distracting and unpleasant advertising signsinto the line of sight. The calculations of utility aremuch the same as before. The rational man findsthat his share of the cost of the wastes hedischarges into the commons is less than thecost of purifying his wastes before releasingthem. Since this is true for everyone, we arelocked into a system of "fouling our own nest," solong as we behave only as independent, rational,free enterprisers.The tragedy of the commons as a food basket isaverted by private property, or somethingformally like it. But the air and waters surroundingus cannot readily be fenced, and so the tragedyof the commons as a cesspool must beprevented by different means, by coercive lawsor taxing devices that make it cheaper for thepolluter to treat his pollutants than to dischargethem untreated. We have not progressed as far

with the solution of this problem as we have withthe first. Indeed, our particular concept of privateproperty, which deters us from exhausting thepositive resources of the earth, favors pollution.The owner of a factory on the bank of a stream --whose property extends to the middle of thestream -- often has difficulty seeing why it is nothis natural right to muddy the waters flowing pasthis door. The law, always behind the times,requires elaborate stitching and fitting to adapt itto this newly perceived aspect of the commons.The pollution problem is a consequence ofpopulation. It did not much matter how a lonelyAmerican frontiersman disposed of his waste."Flowing water purifies itself every ten miles," mygrandfather used to say, and the myth was nearenough to the truth when he was a boy, for therewere not too many people. But as populationbecame denser, the natural chemical andbiological recycling processes becameoverloaded, calling for a redefinition of propertyrights.How to LegislateTemperance?Analysis of the pollution problem as a function ofpopulation density uncovers a not generallyrecognized principle of morality, namely: themorality of an act is a function of the state of thesystem at the time it is performed. [10] Using thecommons as a cesspool does not harm thegeneral public under frontier conditions, becausethere is no public; the same behavior in ametropolis is unbearable. A hundred and fiftyyears ago a plainsman could kill an Americanbison, cut out only the tongue for his dinner, anddiscard the rest of the animal. He was not in anyimportant sense being wasteful. Today, with onlya few thousand bison left, we would be appalledat such behavior.In passing, it is worth noting that the morality ofan act cannot be determined from a photograph.One does not know whether a man killing anelephant or setting fire to the grassland isharming others until one knows the total systemin which his act appears. "One picture is worth athousand words," said an ancient Chinese; but itmay take ten thousand words to validate it. It isas tempting to ecologists as it is to reformers ingeneral to try to persuade others by way of thephotographic shortcut. But the essence of anargument cannot be photographed: it must bepresented rationally -- in words.That morality is system-sensitive escaped theattention of most codifiers of ethics in the past."Thou shalt not…" is the form of traditional ethicaldirectives which make no allowance for particularcircumstances. The laws of our society follow thepattern of ancient ethics, and therefore are poorlysuited to governing a complex, crowded,changeable world. Our epicyclic solution is toaugment statutory law with administrative law.Since it is practically impossible to spell out allthe conditions under which it is safe to burn trashin the back yard or to run an automobile withoutsmog control, by law we delegate the details tobureaus. The result is administrative law, whichis rightly feared for an ancient reason -- Quiscustodies ipsos custodes? --Who shall watch thewatchers themselves? John Adams said that wemust have a "government of laws and not men."Bureau administrators, trying to evaluate themorality of acts in the total system, are singularlyliable to corruption, producing a government bymen, not laws.Prohibition is easy to legislate (though notnecessarily to enforce); but how do we legislatetemperance? Experience indicates that it can beaccomplished best through the mediation ofadministrative law. We limit possibilitiesunnecessarily if we suppose that the sentiment ofQuis custodiet denies us the use ofadministrative law. We should rather retain thephrase as a perpetual reminder of fearfuldangers we cannot avoid. The great challengefacing us now is to invent the correctivefeedbacks that are needed to keep custodianshonest. We must find ways to legitimate theneeded authority of both the custodians and thecorrective feedbacks.Freedom to Breed IsIntolerableThe tragedy of the commons is involved inpopulation problems in another way. In a worldgoverned solely by the principle of "dog eat dog"

--if indeed there ever was such a world--howmany children a family had would not be a matterof public concern. Parents who bred tooexuberantly would leave fewer descendants, notmore, because they would be unable to careadequately for their children. David Lack andothers have found that such a negative feedbackdemonstrably controls the fecundity of birds. [11]But men are not birds, and have not acted likethem for millenniums, at least.If each human family were dependent only on itsown resources; if the children of improvidentparents starved to death; if thus, over breedingbrought its own "punishment" to the germ line --then there would be no public interest incontrolling the breeding of families. But oursociety is deeply committed to the welfare state,[12] and hence is confronted with another aspectof the tragedy of the commons.In a welfare state, how shall we deal with thefamily, the religion, the race, or the class (orindeed any distinguishable and cohesive group)that adopts over breeding as a policy to secureits own aggrandizement? [13] To couple theconcept of freedom to breed with the belief thateveryone born has an equal right to thecommons is to lock the world into a tragic courseof action.Unfortunately this is just the course of action thatis being pursued by the United Nations. In late1967, some thirty nations agreed to the following:"The Universal Declaration of Human Rightsdescribes the family as the natural andfundamental unit of society. It follows that anychoice and decision with regard to the size of thefamily must irrevocably rest with the family itself,and cannot be made by anyone else.'' [14]It is painful to have to deny categorically thevalidity of this right; denying it, one feels asuncomfortable as a resident of Salem,Massachusetts, who denied the reality of witchesin the seventeenth century. At the present time,in liberal quarters, something like a taboo acts toinhibit criticism of the United Nations. There is afeeling that the United Nations is "our last andbest hope," that we shouldn't find fault with it; weshouldn't play into the hands of thearchconservatives. However, let us not forgetwhat Robert Louis Stevenson said: "The truththat is suppressed by friends is the readiestweapon of the enemy." If we love the truth wemust openly deny the validity of the UniversalDeclaration of Human Rights, even though it ispromoted by the United Nations. We should alsojoin with Kingsley Davis [15] in attempting to getPlanned Parenthood-World Population to see theerror of its ways in embracing the same tragicideal.Conscience Is Self-EliminatingIt is a mistake to think that we can control thebreeding of mankind in the long run by an appealto conscience. Charles Galton Darwin made thispoint when he spoke on the centennial of thepublication of his grandfather's great book. Theargument is straightforward and Darwinian.People vary. Confronted with appeals to limitbreeding, some people will undoubtedly respondto the plea more than others. Those who havemore children will produce a larger fraction of thenext generation than those with more susceptibleconsciences. The differences will beaccentuated, generation by generation.In C. G. Darwin's words: "It may well be that itwould take hundreds of generations for theprogenitive instinct to develop in this way, but if itshould do so, nature would have taken herrevenge, and the variety Homo contracipienswould become extinct and would be replaced bythe variety Homo progenitivus. [16]The argument assumes that conscience or thedesire for children (no matter which) ishereditary-but hereditary only in the most generalformal sense. The result will be the samewhether the attitude is transmitted through germcells, or exosomatically, to use A. J. Lotka's term.(If one denies the latter possibility as well as theformer, then what's the point of education?) Theargument has here been stated in the context ofthe population problem, but it applies equally wellto any instance in which society appeals to anindividual exploiting a commons to restrainhimself for the general good -- by means of hisconscience. To make such an appeal is to set up

a selective system that works toward theelimination of conscience from the race.Pathogenic Effects ofConscienceThe long-term disadvantage of an appeal toconscience should be enough to condemn it; butit has serious short-term disadvantages as well. Ifwe ask a man who is exploiting a commons todesist "in the name of conscience," what are wesaying to him? What does he hear? -- not only atthe moment but also in the wee small hours ofthe night when, half asleep, he remembers notmerely the words we used but also the nonverbalcommunication cues we gave him unawares?Sooner or later, consciously or subconsciously,he senses that he has received twocommunications, and that they are contradictory:1. (intended communication) "If you don't do aswe ask, we will openly condemn you for notacting like a responsible citizen"; 2. (theunintended communication) "If you do behave aswe ask, we will secretly condemn you for asimpleton who can be shamed into standingaside while the rest of us exploit the commons."Every man then is caught in what Bateson hascalled a "double bind." Bateson and his coworkershave made a plausible case for viewingthe double bind as an important causative factorin the genesis of schizophrenia. [17] The doublebind may not always be so damaging, but italways endangers the mental health of anyone towhom it is applied. "A bad conscience," saidNietzsche, "is a kind of illness."To conjure up a conscience in others is temptingto anyone who wishes to extend his controlbeyond the legal limits. Leaders at the highestlevel succumb to this temptation. Has anypresident during the past generation failed to callon labor unions to moderate voluntarily theirdemands for higher wages, or to steel companiesto honor voluntary guidelines on prices? I canrecall none. The rhetoric used on such occasionsis designed to produce feelings of guilt in noncooperators.For centuries it was assumed without proof thatguilt was a valuable, perhaps even anindispensable, ingredient of the civilized life.Now, in this post-Freudian world, we doubt it.Paul Goodman speaks from the modern point ofview when he says: "No good has ever comefrom feeling guilty, neither intelligence, policy, norcompassion. The guilty do not pay attention tothe object but only to themselves, and not evento their own interests, which might make sense,but to their anxieties.'' [18]One does not have to be a professionalpsychiatrist to see the consequences of anxiety.We in the Western world are just emerging froma dreadful two centuries-long Dark Ages of Erosthat was sustained partly by prohibition laws, butperhaps more effectively by the anxietygeneratingmechanisms of education. AlexComfort has told the story well in The AnxietyMakers; [19] it is not a pretty one.Since proof is difficult, we may even concedethat the results of anxiety may sometimes, fromcertain points of view, be desirable. The largerquestion we should ask is whether, as a matterof policy, we should ever encourage the use of atechnique the tendency (if not the intention) ofwhich is psychologically pathogenic. We hearmuch talk these days of responsible parenthood;the coupled words are incorporated into the titlesof some organizations devoted to birth control.Some people have proposed massivepropaganda campaigns to instill responsibilityinto the nation's (or the world's) breeders. Butwhat is the meaning of the word conscience?When we use the word responsibility in theabsence of substantial sanctions are we nottrying to browbeat a free man in a commons intoacting against his own interest? Responsibility isa verbal counterfeit for a substantial quid proquo. It is an attempt to get something for nothing.If the word responsibility is to be used at all, Isuggest that it be in the sense Charles Frankeluses it. [20] "Responsibility," says thisphilosopher, "is the product of definite socialarrangements." Notice that Frankel calls forsocial arrangements -- not propaganda.Mutual Coercion MutuallyAgreed Upon

The social arrangements that produceresponsibility are arrangements that createcoercion, of some sort. Consider bank robbing.The man who takes money from a bank acts as ifthe bank were a commons. How do we preventsuch action? Certainly not by trying to control hisbehavior solely by a verbal appeal to his sense ofresponsibility. Rather than rely on propagandawe follow Frankel's lead and insist that a bank isnot a commons; we seek the definite socialarrangements that will keep it from becoming acommons. That we thereby infringe on thefreedom of would-be robbers we neither deny norregret.The morality of bank robbing is particularly easyto understand because we accept completeprohibition of this activity. We are willing to say"Thou shalt not rob banks," without providing forexceptions. But temperance also can be createdby coercion. Taxing is a good coercive device. Tokeep downtown shoppers temperate in their useof parking space we introduce parking meters forshort periods, and traffic fines for longer ones.We need not actually forbid a citizen to park aslong as he wants to; we need merely make itincreasingly expensive for him to do so. Notprohibition, but carefully biased options are whatwe offer him. A Madison Avenue man might callthis persuasion; I prefer the greater candor of theword coercion.Coercion is a dirty word to most liberals now, butit need not forever be so. As with the four-letterwords, its dirtiness can be cleansed away byexposure to the light, by saying it over and overwithout apology or embarrassment. To many, theword coercion implies arbitrary decisions ofdistant and irresponsible bureaucrats; but this isnot a necessary part of its meaning. The onlykind of coercion I recommend is mutual coercion,mutually agreed upon by the majority of thepeople affected.To say that we mutually agree to coercion is notto say that we are required to enjoy it, or even topretend we enjoy it. Who enjoys taxes? We allgrumble about them. But we accept compulsorytaxes because we recognize that voluntary taxeswould favor the conscienceless. We institute and(grumblingly) support taxes and other coercivedevices to escape the horror of the commons.An alternative to the commons need not beperfectly just to be preferable. With real estateand other material goods, the alternative wehave chosen is the institution of private propertycoupled with legal inheritance. Is this systemperfectly just? As a genetically trained biologist Ideny that it is. It seems to me that, if there are tobe differences in individual inheritance, legalpossession should be perfectly correlated withbiological inheritance-that those who arebiologically more fit to be the custodians ofproperty and power should legally inherit more.But genetic recombination continually makes amockery of the doctrine of "like father, like son"implicit in our laws of legal inheritance. An idiotcan inherit millions, and a trust fund can keep hisestate intact. We must admit that our legalsystem of private property plus inheritance isunjust -- but we put up with it because we are notconvinced, at the moment, that anyone hasinvented a better system. The alternative of thecommons is too horrifying to contemplate.Injustice is preferable to total ruin.It is one of the peculiarities of the warfarebetween reform and the status quo that it isthoughtlessly governed by a double standard.Whenever a reform measure is proposed it isoften defeated when its opponents triumphantlydiscover a flaw in it. As Kingsley Davis haspointed out, [21] worshipers of the status quosometimes imply that no reform is possiblewithout unanimous agreement, an implicationcontrary to historical fact. As nearly as I canmake out, automatic rejection of proposedreforms is based on one of two unconsciousassumptions: (1) that the status quo is perfect; or(2) that the choice we face is between reformand no action; if the proposed reform isimperfect, we presumably should take no actionat all, while we wait for a perfect proposal.But we can never do nothing. That which wehave done for thousands of years is also action.It also produces evils. Once we are aware thatthe status quo is action, we can then compare itsdiscoverable advantages and disadvantages withthe predicted advantages and disadvantages ofthe proposed reform, discounting as best we can

for our lack of experience. On the basis of such acomparison, we can make a rational decisionwhich will not involve the unworkable assumptionthat only perfect systems are tolerable.Recognition of NecessityPerhaps the simplest summary of this analysis ofman's population problems is this: the commons,if justifiable at all, is justifiable only underconditions of low-population density. As thehuman population has increased, the commonshas had to be abandoned in one aspect afteranother.First we abandoned the commons in foodgathering, enclosing farm land and restrictingpastures and hunting and fishing areas. Theserestrictions are still not complete throughout theworld.Somewhat later we saw that the commons as aplace for waste disposal would also have to beabandoned. Restrictions on the disposal ofdomestic sewage are widely accepted in theWestern world; we are still struggling to close thecommons to pollution by automobiles, factories,insecticide sprayers, fertilizing operations, andatomic energy installations.In a still more embryonic state is our recognitionof the evils of the commons in matters ofpleasure. There is almost no restriction on thepropagation of sound waves in the publicmedium. The shopping public is assaulted withmindless music, without its consent. Ourgovernment has paid out billions of dollars tocreate a supersonic transport which woulddisturb 50,000 people for every one personwhisked from coast to coast 3 hours faster.Advertisers muddy the airwaves of radio andtelevision and pollute the view of travelers. Weare a long way from outlawing the commons inmatters of pleasure. Is this because our Puritaninheritance makes us view pleasure assomething of a sin, and pain (that is, the pollutionof advertising) as the sign of virtue?Every new enclosure of the commons involvesthe infringement of somebody's personal liberty.Infringements made in the distant past areaccepted because no contemporary complains ofa loss. It is the newly proposed infringementsthat we vigorously oppose; cries of "rights" and"freedom" fill the air. But what does "freedom"mean? When men mutually agreed to pass lawsagainst robbing, mankind became more free, notless so. Individuals locked into the logic of thecommons are free only to bring on universal ruin;once they see the necessity of mutual coercion,they become free to pursue other goals. I believeit was Hegel who said, "Freedom is therecognition of necessity."The most important aspect of necessity that wemust now recognize, is the necessity ofabandoning the commons in breeding. Notechnical solution can rescue us from the miseryof overpopulation. Freedom to breed will bringruin to all. At the moment, to avoid harddecisions many of us are tempted topropagandize for conscience and responsibleparenthood. The temptation must be resisted,because an appeal to independently actingconsciences selects for the disappearance of allconscience in the long run, and an increase inanxiety in the short.The only way we can preserve and nurture otherand more precious freedoms is by relinquishingthe freedom to breed, and that very soon."Freedom is the recognition of necessity" -- and itis the role of education to reveal to all thenecessity of abandoning the freedom to breed.Only so, can we put an end to this aspect of thetragedy of the commons.

Notes1. J. B. Wiesner and H. F. York, Scientific American 211 (No. 4), 27 (1964).2. G. Hardin, Journal of Heredity 50, 68 (1959), S. von Hoernor, Science 137, 18, (1962).3. J. von Neumann and O. Morgenstern, Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (PrincetonUniversity Press, Princeton, N.J., 1947), p. 11.4. J. H. Fremlin, New Scientist, No. 415 (1964), p. 285.5. A. Smith, The Wealth of Nations (Modern Library, New York, 1937), p. 423.6. W. F. Lloyd, Two Lectures on the Checks to Population (Oxford University Press, Oxford, England,1833).7. A. N. Whitehead, Science and the Modern World (Mentor, New York, 1948), p. 17.8. G. Hardin, Ed., Population, Evolution, and Birth Control (Freeman, San Francisco, 1964), p. 56.9. S. McVay, Scientific American 216 (No. 8), 13 (1966).10. J. Fletcher, Situation Ethics (Westminster, Philadelphia, 1966).11. D. Lack, The Natural Regulation of Animal Numbers (Clarendon Press, Oxford, England, 1954).12. H. Girvetz, From Wealth to Welfare (Stanford University Press, Stanford, Calif, 1950).13. G. Hardin, Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 6, 366 (1963).14. U Thant, International Planned Parenthood News, No. 168 (February 1968), p. 3.15. K. Davis, Science 158, 730 (1967).16. S. Tax, Ed., Evolution After Darwin (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1960), vol. 2, p. 469.17. G. Bateson, D. D. Jackson, J. Haley, J. Weakland, Behavioral Science 1, 251 (1956).18. P. Goodman, New York Review of Books 10 (8), 22 (23 May 1968).19. A. Comfort, The Anxiety Makers (Nelson, London, 1967).20. C. Frankel, The Case for Modern Man (Harper & Row, New York, 1955), p. 203.21. J. D. Roslansky, Genetics and the Future of Man (Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York, 1966), p.177.

THE TRAGEDY OF THE COMMON REVISITEDby Beryl Crowe (1969)reprinted in MANAGING THE COMMONSby Garrett Hardin and John BadenW.H. Freeman, 1977; ISBN 0-7167-0476-5"There has developed in the contemporary natural sciences a recognition that there is a subset ofproblems, such as population, atomic war, and environmental corruption, for which there are notechnical solutions."There is also an increasing recognition among contemporary social scientists that there is a subsetof problems, such as population, atomic war, environmental corruption, and the recovery of a livableurban environment, for which there are no current political solutions. The thesis of this article is thatthe common area shared by these two subsets contains most of the critical problems that threatenthe very existence of contemporary man." [p. 53]ASSUMPTIONS NECESSARY TO AVOID THE TRAGEDY"In passing the technically insoluble problems over to the political and social realm for solution, Hardinmade three critical assumptions:(1) that there exists, or can be developed, a 'criterion of judgment and system of weighting . . .' thatwill 'render the incommensurables . . . commensurable . . . ' in real life;(2) that, possessing this criterion of judgment, 'coercion can be mutually agreed upon,' and that theapplication of coercion to effect a solution to problems will be effective in modern society; and(3) that the administrative system, supported by the criterion of judgment and access to coercion, canand will protect the commons from further desecration." [p. 55]ERODING MYTH OF THE COMMON VALUE SYSTEM"In America there existed, until very recently, a set of conditions which perhaps made the solution toHardin's subset possible; we lived with the myth that we were 'one people, indivisible. . . .' This mythpostulated that we were the great 'melting pot' of the world wherein the diverse cultural ores ofEurope were poured into the crucible of the frontier experience to produce a new alloy -- an Americancivilization. This new civilization was presumably united by a common value system that wasdemocratic, equalitarian, and existing under universally enforceable rules contained in theConstitution and the Bill of Rights."In the United States today, however, there is emerging a new set of behavior patterns which suggestthat the myth is either dead or dying. Instead of believing and behaving in accordance with the myth,large sectors of the population are developing life-styles and value hierarchies that give contemporaryAmericans an appearance more closely analogous to the particularistic, primitive forms of 'tribal'organizations in geographic proximity than to that shining new alloy, the American civilization." [p. 56]"Looking at a more recent analysis of the sickness of the core city, Wallace F. Smith has argued thatthe productive model of the city is no longer viable for the purposes of economic analysis. Instead, hedevelops a model of the city as a site for leisure consumption, and then seems to suggest that thenature of this model is such is such that the city cannot regain its health because the leisure demandsare value-based and, hence do not admit to compromise and accommodation; consequently there isno way of deciding among these value- oriented demands that are being made on the core city."In looking for the cause of the erosion of the myth of a common value system, it seems to me that solong as our perceptions and knowledge of other groups were formed largely through the writtenmedia of communication, the American myth that we were a giant melting pot of equalitarians couldbe sustained. In such a perceptual field it is tenable, if not obvious, that men are motivated byinterests. Interests can always be compromised and accommodated without undermining our verybeing by sacrificing values. Under the impact of electronic media, however, this psychologicaldistance has broken down and now we discover that these people with whom we could formerly

compromise on interests are not, after all, really motivated by interests but by values. Their behaviorin our very living room betrays a set of values, moreover, that are incompatible with our own, andconsequently the compromises that we make are not those of contract but of culture. While theformer are acceptable, any form of compromise on the latter is not a form of rational behavior but israther a clear case of either apostasy or heresy. Thus we have arrived not at an age ofaccommodation but one of confrontation. In such an age 'incommensurables' remain'incommensurable' in real life." [p. 59]EROSION OF THE MYTH OF THE MONOPOLY OF COERCIVE FORCE"In the past, those who no longer subscribed to the values of the dominant culture were held in checkby the myth that the state possessed a monopoly on coercive force. This myth has undergonecontinual erosion since the end of World War II owing to the success of the strategy of guerrillawarfare, as first revealed to the French in Indochina, and later conclusively demonstrated in Algeria.Suffering as we do from what Senator Fulbright has called 'the arrogance of power,' we have beenextremely slow to learn the lesson in Vietnam, although we now realize that war is political andcannot be won by military means. It is apparent that the myth of the monopoly of coercive force as itwas first qualified in the civil rights conflict in the South, then in our urban ghettos, next on the streetsof Chicago, and now on our college campuses has lost its hold over the minds of Americans. Thetechnology of guerrilla warfare has made it evident that, while the state can win battles, it cannot winwars of values. Coercive force which is centered in the modern state cannot be sustained in the faceof the active resistance of some 10 percent of the population unless the state is willing to embark on adeliberate policy of genocide directed against the value dissident groups. The factor that sustainedthe myth of coercive force in the past was the acceptance of a common value system. Whether thelatter exists is questionable in the modern nation-state." [p.p. 59-60]EROSION OF THE MYTH OF ADMINISTRATORS OF THE COMMONS"Indeed, the process has been so widely commented upon that one writer postulated a common lifecycle for all of the attempts to develop regulatory policies. The life cycle is launched by an outcry sowidespread and demanding that it generates enough political force to bring about establishment of aregulatory agency to insure the equitable, just, and rational distribution of the advantages among allholders of interest in the commons. This phase is followed by the symbolic reassurance of theoffended as the agency goes into operation, developing a period of political quiescence among thegreat majority of those who hold a general but unorganized interest in the commons. Once thispolitical quiescence has developed, the highly organized and specifically interested groups who wishto make incursions into the commons bring sufficient pressure to bear through other politicalprocesses to convert the agency to the protection and furthering of their interests. In the last phaseeven staffing of the regulating agency is accomplished by drawing the agency administrators from theranks of the regulated." [p.p. 60-61]