The Tragedy of the Commons (Science paper)

For my Environmental Science class, we were to write a paper about The Tragedy of the Commons. I understand this is not understood by many people as I was not exactly sure what The Tragedy of the Commons was until I did research and put my paper together. Hope you enjoy.

“Tragedy of the Commons”

            The Tragedy of the Commons was written by Garrett Hardin being that he thought that human beings would allow societies to collapse. He thought that people would act on their own self-interest. However, he did not realize that we now live in societies which depend on one another. Being in these societies, we group together to help the environment grow and develop in the long term. The Tragedy of the Commons refers to the decrease in general necessities. We take responsibility for maintaining a resource in low supply if demand is big enough. Even though some people may seem like they do not care, they want to keep their land suitable for their children and other people that will be living there in future years. They clean up after themselves and keep the land clean. Some people volunteer at local events, such as a hospital, library or a park. However, there are many ways that the commons can become destroyed or start to decline.

            The commons can become damaged by human pollution, air pollution, water pollution, and population growth leading to overpopulation, forests, energy resources, climate, animals and oceans. Because of overpopulation, the problem of pollution has gotten worse. Air became polluted by industrial emissions and cars as well as indoor air. Indoor air pollution is mostly caused by tobacco smoke. Water pollution is also a major issue because of the water problem of over-extraction of groundwater and wasting water due to over irrigation. Forests are endangered because of frontier logging and “slash and burn”. There is a problem with energy resources, such as burning fossil fuels, which leads to the climate change into global warming. Animals have a part in the destruction of the commons because of habitat destruction and poaching, which leads to their extinction. There also has been overfishing in many oceans.

            One of the main and obvious ways of the destruction of the commons is herders sharing a large piece of land. They keep as many of their animals on this land as they can. This had worked great back then because tribal wars, poaching and disease kept the number of men to animal ratio about even. However, that is not the case now as many people trying to stop the “tragedy of the commons”. They want to protect the earth from pollution by automobiles, factories, insecticide sprayers, fertilizing operations, and atomic energy installations. Limitations on the removal of household sewage are widely accepted in the Western world.

            An example of a place trying to save the tragedy of the commons is National Parks. People need to treat parks as the commons or they might not be open to everyone. If they continue to be open to everyone, no one will want to go to any park because of its condition. They are open to whoever wishes to go there and there are no limits. An example of an ongoing population growth at a National Park is the Yosemite Valley in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California. It is located in the counties of Tuolumne, Mariposa, & Madera of California. Because of the overpopulation and the conditions, people do not see the same beauty as they once did before.

            A nearby example is Holmdel Park, where people do not seem to take care of the property of the park as they once used to. There are many wild animals located there and with their rapid population growth, people have decided to set up an area to hunt deer with bow and arrow. Parks are the basis of farmland and many people in the United States do not have much of it. In the past, a single family would have many acres of land. Now with the population growth and the economy worsening, one acre has been split up between twenty or more families. Another example is the overfishing of the Grand Banks, which in present times is located on the Columbia River in the Northwest United States. In modern Russia and in the United States, there is inadequate water available in parched regions. This includes the area of the Aral Sea and Los Angeles, especially at Mono Lake and Owens Lake. These are places where water supply is crucial. In non-developed countries, there are many commons where many people let their animals run free. This leads to destruction of the farm and nowhere for the animals to go.

            In all, the Tragedy of the Commons by Garrett Hardin had interesting ideas. On the other hand, he thought that humans would turn into ignorant people who will not help out with the environment. We have come to learn that the environment is indeed in need for fixing and keeping up with. People do not destroy their property as Hardin must have thought; they only help with the property that is theirs. If everyone does their part, the environment should be a cleaner and more beautiful place.