Understanding How to Govern While Sharing IT

by Bill Walton

In 1968, an ecologist named Garrett Hardin published an article in Science titled "The Tragedy of the Commons."¹ This article described a dilemma in which multiple individuals acting independently and rationally, driven by their own self-interest, will ultimately destroy a shared limited resource even when it is clear that it is not in anyone's long-term interest for this to happen.