The tragedy of the commons logic applies to voting, war, and charity

Evidence

The present analysis of causal versus diagnostic contingencies recalls the tragedy of the commons and it applies to other phenomena in which collective action dwarfs the causal significance of a single individual’s contribution. The outcomes of most wars would not have changed had one fewer draftee been inducted, and the success or failure of most charity drives do not ordinarily depend on the dollars of an individual donor. These collective actions defy a routine rational analysis for the individual because if each citizen, draftee, or donor “rationally” refrains from making his or her paltry contribution, then the outcomes would be drastically affected. For this reason, exhortations to vote, to fight, and to help those less fortunate than oneself are usually framed, “If you don’t vote/fight/ contribute, think of what would happen if everyone felt the same way.” This argument is compelling. Still, just how does an individual’s private decision materially affect the decisions made by countless other persons? — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 2521

Categorization

• XREF: Directly instantiates the collective-action paradox familiar from Hardin’s tragedy of the commons and standard public-goods models in political economy. — connects to: Hobbes prefigured the tragedy-of-the-commons logic two centuries early — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology,…, 816
• DEEPTHINKING: The closing question—how an individual private decision affects countless others’ decisions—is the pivot between rational and psychological accounts of political action.