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The Politics of Inner Space: Tragedies of Three Commons
Author(s) -
LAVER MICHAEL
Publication year - 1984
Publication title -
european journal of political research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.267
H-Index - 95
eISSN - 1475-6765
pISSN - 0304-4130
DOI - 10.1111/j.1475-6765.1984.tb00079.x
Subject(s) - tragedy of the commons , commons , tragedy (event) , politics , action (physics) , allegory , geostationary orbit , law and economics , space (punctuation) , argument (complex analysis) , key (lock) , epistemology , satellite , sociology , law , computer science , political science , physics , philosophy , computer security , literature , astronomy , social science , linguistics , art , biochemistry , chemistry , quantum mechanics
The tragedy of the commons is now a widely used allegory on the problems of collective action. This paper shows, however, that generalizations from the original story to other applications are dangerous. This is because several key properties of a common influence the most appropriate method of avoiding the tragedy. The argument is developed using discussion of three space commons. These are the broadcasting frequency spectrum, the geostationary satellite orbit and the Moon. Each has different properties that involve different tragedies and invite different solutions.