The Core Challenges of Moving Beyond Garrett Hardin

Hardin’s theory-depicting a set of pastoralists inexorably trapped in the overuse of their common pasture-was thought for many years to be typical for common-pool resources (CPRs) not owned privately or by a government. Since Hardin thought the users would be ‘trapped’ in their tragic overuse of a resource, he advocated two solutions to prevent future tragedies: state control or individual ownership. We need to move beyond this simplistic approach, but face challenges in doing so.