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154 ANDRÁS TAKÁCS-SÁNTA
The sum total of all environmental problems in the world is termed the
ecological crisis. Its existence was widely realized in the late 1960s and early 1970s,
particularly in the countries of the center’ (e.g. McNeill 2000). Today, global
climate change, the decrease of biological diversity, the presence of synthetic
chemicals in the environment, the air pollution of settlements, and soil erosion
are regarded as the main elements of the crisis, although which is deemed the
gravest depends on geographic location, system of values and other factors. These
interrelated concerns threaten the lives, or at least the quality of life, of people and
multitudes of other living beings alike. It is an important aspect that we humans
are not only victims but also causes of the ecological crisis, for it is the consequence
of the everyday decisions and acts of individuals, groups of people and organizations.
How can the tragedy be avoided?
Gianni Rodari, the great Italian storyteller, has written three different endings to
several of his tales. It is at the reader’s discretion to choose the one he/she likes
best. Fortunately, the above tale is also similar to Rodari’s: Hardin’s model is only
a zero-sum game (Dietz 2005). The tragic ending is not inevitable; tragedy can be
turned into comedy in several ways. That such an ending needs greater effort is
of course another question (Dietz et al. 2002). A comedy is also a dramatic play,
but the ending — at least — is happy.
The avoidance of tragedy is, in theory, simple: from the above-mentioned two
postulates, at least one has to be resolved: either we have to lay down the rules of
using the pasture, that is, to stop free access to it; or, we have to change human
motivation, that is, get the farmers to consider more than short-term individual
gains.
The first step needed to put an end to free access is for somebody to take
ownership of the pasture. Then the owner(s) set up institutions’: some people are
banned from using the pasture or rules are laid down so as to restrict the use of
the pasture. Basically, three kinds of ownership are possible: (1) private property,
On the one hand, the herdsmen — “the cattle” (the humans inhabiting the earth) “drive to grass”
their own offspring. On the other hand, “overgrazing” depends directly on other factors as well,
in addition to the number of the inhabitants (Takacs-Santa 2017; 2022).
The countries of the center are the economically powerful states in the world that are capable of
modifying the conditions of international trade so that the surplus value flows from the economically
weaker states, the countries of the periphery, toward them. (On the theory of the center and the
periphery, see, e.g., Wallerstein 2004).
It must be noted that the prevention of the tragedy might be influenced by yet another factor:
the nature of the “commons” (Dietz et al. 2002). For example, ecosystems with hard-to-predict
dynamics (such as several water ecosystems) or mobile resources (e.g. fish) make it hard for people
to be good stewards of these resources (Ostrom 2009), hence the tragedy is more likely to happen.
This third factor is not discussed in this paper, because unlike the other two, this one cannot be
modified by humans.
The word “institution” is used in the sociological sense, not as colloquially understood: an institution
is that which becomes systemic, regular (institutionalized) in a society. Social institutions are the
constituents of society that can reproduce themselves and hence exist transgenerationally. These
include economic, political, legal, etc. institutions (Miller 2019). Institutions make certain activities
easier for people or organizations, while they may prevent, or at least hinder others.