Air Quality as a Common Resource
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In summary, when common pool resources are threatened beyond the
ability for structural frameworks to resolve (Ostrom, 2010), the risk can be
addressed either by active conservation (converting to a club good) or by
active restoration (converting to a public good). And, of course, a mixture of
both of these can be used as well. Another way to think of this, for those of an
economic bent, is that problems with the optimal use of common resources
can be addressed through regulations (for restoration and/ or conservation)
which incorporate the negative externalities to society into the costs of use by
the individual consumers. The goal of this negative externality function, in an
economic model, is to eliminate “deadweight loss”: The difference between
the optimal use of a common resource in the view of an individual versus the
optimal use of a common resource in the view of the larger society (i.e. eliminating the patterns in which an individual sees more benefit and less cost
to greater personal consumption, compared to a larger societal perspective).
15.3 Public and Club Goods Can Transition
As common resources get overtaxed, they may shift towards being public
goods or club goods. A subsequent threat to these, however, is free riding. Free
riding is when a person does not contribute to the investment for a public good
yet still partakes of the benefits from that good – for example, poaching of fish
or illegal logging. Free riding can also occur with club goods if the excludability
is imperfect (e.g. stealing cable television). When free riding becomes endemic,
it not only damages the stock of the resource or good, but it also can create
resentment and reluctance on the part of the other users who are following the
structural investment or restraint rules (e.g. Price et al., 2002).
Public and club goods that are struggling against free riders can either
strengthen the infrastructure required to maintain those goods, or the situations can further evolve into private goods. A private good is owned by a
specific individual, for use at their discretion (i.e. by themselves or by others
through purchasing it from the owner), and is therefore economically both
rivalrous and excludable.
Physical, moveable items (e.g. clothes, cars, tools) tend to be private goods.
Non- renewable natural resources, such as fossil fuels and land mineral rights,
tend to have evolved towards being private goods, even if they initially were
considered common resources. (Witness the different views on land ownership
between Native Americans and early European settlers in the new world, in
which Europeans with a private goods view of land took advantage of Native
American views of land as a common resource; e.g. Walbert, 2008.). Examples
in the modern world include private parks, privately stocked fishing lakes, and
bottled water. The above potential transitions are summarized in Figure 15.1.
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In summary, when common pool resources are threatened beyond the
ability for structural frameworks to resolve (Ostrom, 2010), the risk can be
addressed either by active conservation (converting to a club good) or by
active restoration (converting to a public good). And, of course, a mixture of
both of these can be used as well. Another way to think of this, for those of an
economic bent, is that problems with the optimal use of common resources
can be addressed through regulations (for restoration and/ or conservation)
which incorporate the negative externalities to society into the costs of use by
the individual consumers. The goal of this negative externality function, in an
economic model, is to eliminate “deadweight loss”: The difference between
the optimal use of a common resource in the view of an individual versus the
optimal use of a common resource in the view of the larger society (i.e. eliminating the patterns in which an individual sees more benefit and less cost
to greater personal consumption, compared to a larger societal perspective).
15.3 Public and Club Goods Can Transition
As common resources get overtaxed, they may shift towards being public
goods or club goods. A subsequent threat to these, however, is free riding. Free
riding is when a person does not contribute to the investment for a public good
yet still partakes of the benefits from that good – for example, poaching of fish
or illegal logging. Free riding can also occur with club goods if the excludability
is imperfect (e.g. stealing cable television). When free riding becomes endemic,
it not only damages the stock of the resource or good, but it also can create
resentment and reluctance on the part of the other users who are following the
structural investment or restraint rules (e.g. Price et al., 2002).
Public and club goods that are struggling against free riders can either
strengthen the infrastructure required to maintain those goods, or the situations can further evolve into private goods. A private good is owned by a
specific individual, for use at their discretion (i.e. by themselves or by others
through purchasing it from the owner), and is therefore economically both
rivalrous and excludable.
Physical, moveable items (e.g. clothes, cars, tools) tend to be private goods.
Non- renewable natural resources, such as fossil fuels and land mineral rights,
tend to have evolved towards being private goods, even if they initially were
considered common resources. (Witness the different views on land ownership
between Native Americans and early European settlers in the new world, in
which Europeans with a private goods view of land took advantage of Native
American views of land as a common resource; e.g. Walbert, 2008.). Examples
in the modern world include private parks, privately stocked fishing lakes, and
bottled water. The above potential transitions are summarized in Figure 15.1.