I will argue there is no exact problem to collective action but the biggest consequence of collective action is defective agents. Anytime I refer to defective agents in the rest of the paper, I will be discussing those who do not maximize utility for society and rather defect from the norm to maximize their own individual utility. I argue that collective action only works effectively if all group members pay their fair share for the common interests of the group. I argue free riding of public goods and the selfish use of available common goods are the main actions performed by defective agents that make collective action a problem. I argue that collective action needs individuals to maximize group utility over personal utility in order to …show more content…
Since it is a one-shot game, people believe it will always be better to maximize their own utility rather than sacrifice some of their profit for the greater good thus becoming defective agents. Defective agents in this situation ultimately stop the public good from being created or operating at optimal standards because they create unfair conditions amongst the group and without them, the good is not feasible. An example of this is a group of four people deciding to finance a museum as a public good. No one member of the group has a desire to finance the museum solely but one person’s contribution is sufficient for the construction of the building. As a defective agent, I argue no one will want to finance the museum and it will never be built because they will take the free riding approach. Furthermore, it would not provide the most utility for any one person if they do contribute so they will always defect to protect themselves as I argue for the common knowledge of rationality. A solution to the agents continuously defecting is to introduce punishments into the game. If someone does not cooperate, they will gain a punishment that will cost more than any utility they profit from not cooperating. Permits would be optimal because if someone does not obtain the permit by cooperating with society, they cannot use the good, slightly changing it to a club good; a good that is excludable …show more content…
Common goods are rivalrous and non-excludable, meaning everyone can use these goods but there is only a limited supply. The most common problem discussed is the tragedy of the commons in which people selfishly use common goods because they can. An agent will continuously ask what is the utility of me taking more and if the answer maximizes their own utility, they will choose that option. A great example of this is a pasture that is provided as a common good to farmers with grazing animals. It is rivalrous because the grass can only be consumed by one animal and not by another but it is non-excludable because the farmers cannot stop another farmer’s animal from grazing. The farmers want to maximize their own utility by adding as many animals as possible so they will ask the question, “What is the utility of me adding one more animal to my heard?” There will either be a positive component of selling an additional animal for the farmer individually or the negative component of overgrazing shared by all the farmers. If the agent is rational, they will become a defective agent and maximize their individual utility by selling another animal because they are in a system that compels them to increase the herd. A solution to the tragedy of the commons is to introduce privatization and split the commons accordingly among the group. There will be a process to
In Part I, Moral Problems, Greene relates Hardin’s “Tragedy of the Commons” to compare individualistic and collectivistic interests. In the “Tragedy of the Commons”, a single group of herders shares a hypothetical common pasture. Hardin posits that, were everyone to act for his or her individual self-interests, the pasture would be eroded and nothing would be left (19). Collective interests should triumph over individual interests whenever possible (24).
The resources will dramatically decrease in the case of open shared resources or “commons”. Hardin insists this is due to the fact that each person will act selfishly and thus gain a benefit to themselves greater than the cost to themselves. Through the shared cost of a commons each person contributes slightly to its destruction and with the growing population of humans at the same rate of consumption, the human race will eventually lose that particular resource. Hardin then presents his solutions which are privatization or “mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon by the majority affected.” In the case of privatization of a commons, all of the cost is placed on one entity which would cause that entity to value the commons enough to exploit it carefully. Mutual coercion would work almost as a reverse commons. Each person takes less of the resource immediately in order to preserve the commons for future benefit. This mutual coercion is not a plausible solution in our current time
The Tragedy of the Commons typically results in resources being over used and depleted (Khan). Let’s say that there are 10 mines being used to dig out iron. Nine of the mines are privately owned, but the tenth mine is open for the public. That tenth mine is going to be over used and depleted to the point where there is no iron left. The other mines and the rest of society will use that one public mine rather than use their own to gather the iron. This occurs with lots of resources. Another great example could be woods for both logging and hunting. If there are public woods where no permits are needed to hunt or chop down trees for lumber, then the society will completely destroy that public ground due to
Another way to manage resource is to set national quotas. The quota system will conserve the stock and optimize harvesting levels. When the quota is in place, wildlife will be protected from over-exploitation. Quotas may be auction to the highest bidder; therefore the winner will enforce rules for harvesting. Open-access problems can be managed if individuals or a certain group controls property rights. While controlling the property rights, regulations may be enforced for better results. Regulations can determine what is allowed or not allowed on the land. To be economically efficient and conserve wildlife, people should harvest at certain time of the day. This will reduce overexploitation and give time for the stocks to reproduce. Ultimately, regulation, quotas, taxes and control will help overexploitation decline at a dramatic rate.
The dilemma of collective actions is an objectively existing social phenomenon. Western scholars create theoretical models about dilemma of collective actions and provide theoretical interpretations according to the reflections to the real world. “These collective actions will be problems such as short supply of public goods, overuse of public resource, disorder of public order, loss of public organization efficiency and anomie of public policy implementation.” (Chen tan, 2009, Theoretical Interpretation … under Non-cooperation Game)
Adam Smiths ‘’invisible hand’’ shows us that when greedy individuals go into big cooperative action it helps their incentives grow into the lines that run to help others. The greed that helps these ‘’big people’’ gives them the incentives to seek out the best and most effective methods of production. The cheaper and more effective they can make a product, the cheaper prices of the product at the store is, which in this case benefits both the producer and consumer!
I will argue that according to Rawls, agents in the Original Position behind a veil of ignorance would not endorse a utilitarianism principle of justice because they, as rational individuals, would seek to create a cooperative scheme that would be the most beneficial to themselves, and advocating for a utilitarian principle of justice under such blind conditions would be far too great a risk for them to take. Utilitarianism is a moral theory asserting that the morally right action is the one that produces the most favorable balance of good over evil, everyone considered (69). It is wholly concerned with the amount of net utility that an action generates. Utilitarianism has been one of the most influential moral theories throughout history.
The pasture field is finite, with a finite amount of resources. Multiple herdsmen keep cattle on the field and directly receive profit. As long as there are enough resources covering each herdsman the so called ‘commons’ is prosperous. Eventually, the number of resources ideally matches the number of herdsmen, i.e there are no extra resources for more herdsmen. The tragedy occurs when a herdsman adds one more unit of cattle onto the shared field.
Therefore a free market is not desirable as maximizing their utility is priority. So government is expected to correct the market failure by choosing to char...
Ostrom used the most frequently used example of a common pool resource; he speaks of the town pasturelands and how they will be overexploited and destroyed by the towns’ citizens without institutions. The overexploitation will come about due to the tragedy of the commons, as individuals will act in their own self-interest instead of the whole group’s long-term best interest, as they believe if they do not use the good then, others will and none will be left for their benefit. To prevent the depletion the town pasturelands we develop an institution with the goal to protect it for the future. To do this the institutions must employ a worker to limit who can use the pasturelands, how much they can use, for how long, and to maintain and repair the pasturelands so it can still provide the maximum benefit possible. To do this, rules are needed and someone is needed to enforce them which has a cost attached to it. To fund the protection of the pasturelands either the common land must become private property so it will be in one individ...