The benefits of the commons

• DOI: 10.1038/340091a0
• Publication Date: 2003-06-12T22:21:16Z
• Authors: F. Berkes; D. Feeny; B. J. McCay; J. M. Acheson
• Keywords: 01 natural sciences; 0105 earth and related environmental sciences

Conventional wisdom holds that resources held in common will invariably be overexploited — the "tragedy of the commons". A number of examples show that this is not necessarily so.