Are you saying that there is no incidence of the tragedy of the commons at all, or just that these things are not tragedies of the commons? If it’s the latter, I think it’s pointless to argue the specifics of any particular examples when the broader point still stands. When there is a tragedy of the commons, one possible solution is to create property rights so that incentives align with social optima, but the problem of the tragedy of the anticommons can arise if the property rights you create are too strong.
In practice, there will be cases where you don’t want to try to re-align incentives. If you have a situation where you are going to be naturally close to the social optimum (maybe the spectrum or the skyline are good examples of this—I’m not familiar with these cases intimately), then unless you have a well-calibrated government you are more likely than not to over-shoot the social optimum. If you have something that’s seriously misaligned—maybe people burning huge amounts of neurotoxin-containing wood and wearing a mask or something—you might overshoot or undershoot the social optimum, but even a poorly-calibrated government might be able to get you closer.
I wouldn’t want to be so absolute and say there is no such thing as the tragedy of the commons, but I am saying that I think it’s vastly overblown, and that in most cases when it’s invoked, it isn’t actually present.
You’re right about that: Many people use the spectre of the tragedy of the commons ad nauseum to sound clever and insulate their own ideological attachments to property rights and private ownership. Usually, when there’s a commons, some sturdy, democratic, responsive trustee entity or market can take care of problems of overuse.
Are you saying that there is no incidence of the tragedy of the commons at all, or just that these things are not tragedies of the commons? If it’s the latter, I think it’s pointless to argue the specifics of any particular examples when the broader point still stands. When there is a tragedy of the commons, one possible solution is to create property rights so that incentives align with social optima, but the problem of the tragedy of the anticommons can arise if the property rights you create are too strong.
In practice, there will be cases where you don’t want to try to re-align incentives. If you have a situation where you are going to be naturally close to the social optimum (maybe the spectrum or the skyline are good examples of this—I’m not familiar with these cases intimately), then unless you have a well-calibrated government you are more likely than not to over-shoot the social optimum. If you have something that’s seriously misaligned—maybe people burning huge amounts of neurotoxin-containing wood and wearing a mask or something—you might overshoot or undershoot the social optimum, but even a poorly-calibrated government might be able to get you closer.
I wouldn’t want to be so absolute and say there is no such thing as the tragedy of the commons, but I am saying that I think it’s vastly overblown, and that in most cases when it’s invoked, it isn’t actually present.
You’re right about that: Many people use the spectre of the tragedy of the commons ad nauseum to sound clever and insulate their own ideological attachments to property rights and private ownership. Usually, when there’s a commons, some sturdy, democratic, responsive trustee entity or market can take care of problems of overuse.