chat

Yes, the entire premise is basically "imagine everyone is an amoral, profit driven capitalist kleptocratic eager to pillage and burn, therefore we must ensure that everything is up for sale to specifically those amoral, profit drive capitalist kleptocrats for... reasons. Yes this is coherent and smart please listen to me."

And of course in reality, the tragedy of the commons was caused by enclosure and capitalist encroachment that communities were prevented from using their traditional "just kick the shit out of someone who's wrecking up the place if they don't stop when you tell them to" methods to defend themselves against. Communal ownership leads to better and more responsible stewardship than commodifying everything for rich bastards to buy, exploit, and despoil.

In fact, the tragedy of the commons only happens when there is an external market able to absorb all produce. After all, the feudal exploitation is limited by the size of the lord's stomach.

Did you ever hear the tragedy of Darth Plagueis The Wise?

no, when capitalism does it it's called an "externality" and it's different because something

Yes. Liberals would have you believe it does not, but it does.

The logic goes that the individuals who use their share more efficiently will make more profits and will outcompete those who don't make good use of resources. That's the general principle behind the invisible hand of the free market, it will promote the more profitable solutions precisely to prevent the pitfalls of the tragedy of the commons.

Then the flaw becomes the supposition that profit equals good use of resources. I think it's better to attack that resulting side of the argument than the basis; people would understand your criticism of the market to equate the capitalist mode of production with a more primitive one. That does away with the nuance that capitalism has brought innovations with it that have opened up new productive capacity. Marxism isn't anti-capitalism.

The argument is supposed to be that it would be irrational to wreck or cannibalize your private property for short-term gain when doing so would eventually leave you without productive property. That kind of behavior is only stopped to happen (according to The Economists) with property held in common, as nobody has an incentive to spend resources safeguarding the future of something that isn't their sole demanse. As we know, capitalism is totally rational and not at all preoccupied with short term gains at the cost of long term destruction, so this has to be right!

It's always proyection

This is an interesting thought. In neoclassical production theory oil is treated simply as scarce input capital, not as a limited natural resource (as the pasture is considered in the tragedy). If we consider oil as being the common pool resource in our capitalism/free market model, when oil runs out what happens to the market when there are no longer any goods being produced that can go into the supply side?

Further thought to consider... is oil managed by the free market on a global scale today? Is it state run? Or cartel managed? The tragedy is resolved through cooperative resource management. I wonder what the world would look like if oil was cooperatively managed on a global scale? I don't mean that there is a global government structure in place that centrally manages oil, I mean a type of cooperative, polycentric governance system?