Why nations should stop competing with each other
Two landmark concepts taken together, game theory and the tragedy of the commons, have illustrated in abstract the destructiveness of competitive self-interest.
Whenever individuals compete by placing their individual interests above the common good, they prove collectively destructive. Believing that to be the case encourages people to imagine that their only choice—and chance—is to get there first, or with more force—or both. In a dog-eat-dog world, they can be bigger, better, faster, cheaper—or they can cheat. That, fundamentally, has been the sermon read out to all of us from free-market pulpits around the world for the last fifty years.
Ostrom’s work proved to her that what works best is collaborative pluralism: lots of different solutions, applied and devised locally by those with an immediate and personal investment. Left to their own devices, individuals can create solutions together that are superior to those imposed by external authorities or managing agents.
Operating across multiple levels is both more sustainable and more robust. “Such an evolutionary approach to policy,” Ostrom noted, “provides essential safety nets should one or more policies fail.”
At all levels, collaboration is key, but even the finest collaborations fall apart if some individuals come to dominate the group or if participants start to form elites. The community must be self-monitoring, and it must design its own sanctions. Conflict is bound to occur—after all, Ostrom was describing real life, not theory—but low-cost conflict resolution mechanisms can resolve them.
The hard problem of managing limited resources creatively was best organized from the ground up in ways that fitted with, and articulated, social norms.
From the book by Heffernan, Margaret. “A Bigger Prize.”