What is the Tragedy of the Commons?
Date Published
On the southern part of Poland there is Tatra Mountains National Park - a picturesque piece of nature with astonishing mountain views and numerous hiking tracks.
When the weather is nice, and especially on a weekend, a lot of tourists and many hikers come to this place. Sometimes it is so crowded... that stops bringing any joy.
But there is a life hack - to enjoy the nature in silence and avoid the queues on the trails one needs to start early in the morning. Seven years ago it was good to start at 7am. And indeed - while coming to the park you could park the car without rush and enjoy your hiking route.
The tip became known to everybody though and last summer to have similar pleasure you needed to be at 5am… Last year at 7 am on the route you feel as if it were the most crowded place on Earth.
What is the Tragedy of the Commons?
Systems Thinking Archetype: The Tragedy of the Commons
The Tragedy of the Commons describes what happens when many individuals, acting in their own self-interest, overuse a shared resource, eventually leading to its depletion.
It is the case when everyone tries to maximize their own gain from something that belongs to everyone. In the end, nobody wins.
This pattern isn't just a theoretical concept, it can be easily observed in our daily lives, our teams, across entire organizations, and even in the world - all you need to do is just stop, think and analyze some happenings.
Let's see how the "Tragedy of the Commons" appears in different contexts.
Personal Challenge: You can easily imagine this one if you have a shared bathroom with a boiler for hot water for your whole family. If everyone uses the hot water for long showers without considering others, the last person might end up with a cold shower.
In this case the "common" resource is hot water supply if used without considering others leads to the point that someone gets a cold shower, and potential arguments later.
Another example is from team’s life: Consider a team with a shared documentation repository - a usual case when we want to store the artifacts somewhere. If everyone adds information without structuring it properly or updating it, the knowledge base becomes hard to navigate.
Each person might add their piece of information quickly without considering others (well, what I can say... I sometimes do this too, especially when in a hurry and forgetting to make a clean-up later), making it harder for everyone else to find what they need.
The "common" resource, the team's knowledge base, when used chaotically, without considering the bigger picture and further impact, leads to ineffective knowledge repository where one can hardly find anything quickly.
Organizational Level: a shared kitchen or a limited amount of meeting rooms available for booking by everyone are very similar cases
Imagine a shared office kitchen. Everyone uses the coffee machine, and nobody takes responsibility for cleaning it. What happens? A dirty machine, stale coffee, and frustration all around. Each person might think, "My one cup won't make a difference," but collectively, this leads to a less enjoyable experience for everyone.
While wanting coffee without putting the effort of cleaning the shared kitchen and its amenities lead to a dirty and unusable kitchen.
Do you find any of these familiar to you?
I assume that you give a yes answer to at least two of the three examples and it just proves that we tend to fall into such a pattern.
So, how do we avoid these "tragedies"? There are a couple of actions to consider:
Define either strict rules and responsibilities or just make an agreement clearly outlining who is responsible for maintaining the shared resource
Promote shared ownership by encouraging everyone to think about the collective good, not just their individual gain. In the kitchen example, it can be a cleaning schedule.
Communication and awareness: make sure everyone understands the potential consequences of their actions on the shared resource.
This pattern isn't limited to our immediate surroundings. It's crucial to recognize the "Tragedy of the Commons" playing out on a larger scale in our cities, countries, and the world.
Think about fishing in international waters. Each fishing fleet has an incentive to maximize its catch. Without effective global agreements and enforcement, this can lead to overfishing and the collapse of fish populations, harming the entire marine ecosystem and the long-term sustainability of the fishing industry.
Consider climate change. A lot has been said about it, right?
And here it comes again… Every individual and every nation contributes to greenhouse gas emissions through various activities. While one person's or one country's emissions might seem insignificant, the collective impact is causing significant and potentially irreversible damage to our shared atmosphere.
And you know, it is not only about gas emissions: population growth, plants build, raw material usage - it all impacts how the climate changes and we continue thinking - ah, my impact is not meaningful - you are wrong.
The system is the more than just the sum of its elements - if we put all those small impacts together, they become an enormous force.
Unfortunately, often we do not want to think that level and avoid talking about these global challenges... As a result we focus on short-time personal gains leading to...
When we utilize common resources (natural, digital, or organizational), the individual choices we make have a cumulative effect. What seems like a small, harmless action on its own can contribute to a larger problem when many others act similarly.
In general, coping with the "Tragedy of the Commons" often involves:
Defining and understanding the "commons": what shared resource are we using?
Establishing rules and boundaries: what are acceptable levels of use?
Implementing monitoring and feedback mechanisms: how can we track the health of the resource and the impact of our actions?
Fostering communication and collaboration: how can we work together to manage the resource sustainably?
Considering incentives and disincentives: are there ways to reward responsible use and discourage overuse?
By recognizing this pattern in our personal lives, our teams, and our organizations, we can move beyond a purely individualistic mindset and embrace a greater sense of collective responsibility.
Can you think of a time you've witnessed the Tragedy of the Commons in action in a project or team?
What happened, and what could have been done differently?
Share your thoughts in the comments below!