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The EU Cannot Be at the Mercy of the Few (2016)

Manfred Kets de Vries

"The tragedy of the commons"

A small group of farmers blocking an important trade agreement highlights the EU’s vulnerability to the “tragedy of the commons”. The “tragedy of the commons,” an idea made widely known by Garrett Hardin, an American ecologist and philosopher in 1968, is a problem that occurs when individuals exploit a shared resource independently according to their own self-interest to the detriment of the common good of all users.

INSEAD Knowledge, 2016

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