Business and the Tragedy of the Commons

Abstract

In 1968 Garrett Hardin, a professor of biology, published in Science his by now famous article entitled The Tragedy of the Commons’ (Hardin, 1968). The simple but far reaching idea in Hardin’s article was well summarized in an issue of The Economist (2008): “Open a pasture to all and every herdsman will have an incentive to add another animal to his herd. If every rational herdsman striving for its benefit goes on to add another animal, the pasture will become overgrazed and overexploited. The end of the story is a tragedy.”1 To prevent the tragedy of overexploitation, one of Hardin’s suggested solutions was to replace the commons by systems of private or public ownership in order to exploit the land in a more efficient way. Forty years after the publication of Hardin’s article, we may be puzzled about the rightness of Hardin’s analysis and suggestions. The tragedy of the commons is still with us. Is it reasonable to believe that private or collective ownership can solve the tragedy of overexploitation? Or do we believe that good management of the commons requires a new concept of ownership and management?2 In this chapter I will argue that we need a new concept of management to overcome the tragedy of the commons and that business spirituality is a necessary ingredient in this new concept of management of the commons.