Excerpt from ‘Filters Against Folly’ by Garret Hardin
We have often tried to solve problems without considering how potentialities, behavior and value are affected by scale.
Mouse unequal to elephant – As far back as the 17th century, Galileo gave sound mathematical reasons why a mouse simply cannot be as big as an elephant. The weight of an animal goes up as the cube of its linear dimensions, whereas the strength of its supporting limbs goes up only as the square.
For A of length 3 units long, Weight is 3 x 3 x 3 = 27, Strength of legs is 3 x 3 = 9. For B of length 6 units long, Weight is 6 x 6 x 6 = 216, Strength of legs is 6 x 6 = 36.
B is two times longer than A. B’s legs can bear only 4 times as much as weight but its weight is 8 times heavier (and has the same number of legs). So B’s legs are only half as strong as they need to be (4 divided by 8). Clearly something has to change as the length of the animal increases. If the material of which the legs are composed is the same, then the cross sectional area of the leg has to be doubled. The leg has to be thicker. This is not all. Since heavier bones will require more powerful muscles, many secondary changes in appearance will also be necessary, not to mention the behavior which must correlate with the lightness or massiveness of the body. If mice evolved to be as big as elephants, their silhouette would be that of elephants. Thus simple maths proves the point that a mouse cannot be as big as an elephant.
The scale of things determines what is functionally best. This applies to not only to shapes of animals but also shapes of airplanes and countless human artifacts. Scale is also relevant to the problems political and moral philosophers deal with. A politico-economic system that works well with small numbers may fail utterly with large. This is one of the most important factors accounting for the ultimate failure of utopian communities.
The success and failure of communities based on privatism or socialism is hard to predict, but of a commonistic community it can be firmly asserted that it is sure to fail – unless it remains small enough to enjoy certain advantages of scale.
Scale Effect and the Cowboy Mentality – In an uncrowded world like the one our ancestors enjoyed, a commonistic arrangement may be satisfactory. Fruit taken from common trees present in excess, or game animals harvested from vast wild herds, do not demonstrably diminish the resources available next year. Similarly disposing waste in vast areas may not harm other people, so long as metabolic powers of uncrowded nature are more than sufficient to recycle the elements. A “cowboy economy” is a rational and acceptable adaptation to frontier conditions. In such a world it would be silly and wasteful either to try to fence in the game as a form of private property, or to pay public guardians to watch after the common property.
But the politico-economic system that works well on the frontier breaks down miserably in a world as crowded as ours. Unfortunately, long after the reality has vanished, the dream of an uncrowded world endures, often romantically glorified. The persistence of this sentimental dream is one of the things that accounts for the clear conscience of the game poacher: to him the commons seems somehow the morally superior distribution system.
In the name of individual freedom, both poachers and libertarians would unwittingly recreate the commons with its tragic consequences. In a trivially abstract sense, would be modern cowboys may have a good idea, but the scale is wrong. The judgment of “good” must be tied to scale.
Scale and the Effectiveness of Shame – The larger the community, the more necessary is some form of government.
Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil.
Thomas Paine
Hundreds of communities based on common sense distribution were established in the 19th century. There was a second flowering in the 1960s. Most the groups disintegrated within few years.
In all this plethora there are only a few success stories, of which the story of the Hutteries is the clearest example. It has survived three generations – it tells us much about commonism. These people united by religion, live in agricultural colonies in the north-western United States and adjacent areas of Canada. They live by Marx’s ability/needs equation. They are immensely successful. They accept the best of modern agriculture and medicine while rejecting all forms of birth control. As a result they are a fast growing population with average of 10 children per women.
Why have thousands of other idealistic communities committed to Marxist ethic failed to persist? “For each according to his ability, to each according to his needs” sounds simple enough, but it evades this question: Who decides what a person needs and what he can do? If the state decides it socialism. If each individual decides for himself, that’s archaism or commonism. When dreamers set up idealistic communities they almost invariably opt for commonism since it appears to be most compatible with the selfish and individualistic impulses that have been selected for thousands of years.
The Marxist system is critically sensitive to scale. Hutteries found this out long ago when they noticed that as their community grew in size. Workers found excuses to not work, what were at first actions of a few became actions of many, as some of the hardest workers decided they were unwilling to carry the burden of the whole community. Altruism diminished as envy and resentment grew. The answer, the Hutterities found, lay in controlling the scale. As long as the community was less than some apparently critical number (about 100 to 150), the Marxist distribution worked and failed badly as the numbers increased. So long as abilities and needs are determined within a really small community, commonism works.
Why the sensitivity to scale? The effective force is shame, which keeps individuals from abusing the right to determine their own abilities and needs in a small community. A potential goldbrick in a small community can be shamed by public opinion into doing his share of the work and not taking more than a fair share of the proceeds. As the community grows in size, the effectiveness of shame diminishes. Why? Perhaps because each individual is less visible.
The essential point is that commonism will not work in a community that is sizable, where the word means more than 100 to 150 members.
The Importance of Management costs: Sidewalks are successfully commonized (funded through taxes) in cities despite being crowded. Why?
The principles involved have general application. A commonized sidewalk is not likely to be overused because each person is physically limited in the amount of need he can muster. If someone walks twice as fast and thus use up the sidewalks at twice the average rate, who cares? So small an excess exacts no perceived sacrifice on the part of those who demand less. Theoretically we could charge individuals in proportion to their use, but it is quite obvious that the management cost for this will be quite out of proportion to the good that could be achieved. So all of us – economic libertarians, capitalists, socialists, everyone – cheerfully take care of our sidewalk needs on a commonistic basis.
Even so, this decision is based on scale. At some high level of crowding we might decide that we needed another system, probably a socialistic one. Streets as a parking space is an example. Unmanaged, on a first come first served basis, favor those whose time is worth relatively less and who can afford to come early. Those who have more money than time resent this.
Parking meters proctored by municipal employees restrict on a socialistic basis. Alternatively, privately owned garages deal with the problem within the framework of privatism. Once scale of cities has passed a certain point, if time is of any value, there is no rational defense for the commonistic arrangement.
In choosing one system or another we must always keep in mind the danger of escalation. If my neighbor fills his house with guests, it would be foolish of me to worry about the extra load on the commons of the sewage system. The management costs of making the charges “fair”, i.e. strictly proportional to use, just aren’t worth the possible gain. But sewers in factories are different from the standard and non-escalating needs of domestic households. Needs of industries are all too capable of escalating, with disastrous consequences for communities that fail to make the necessary distinction. It is not cost effective to put a pollution meter on the stage of every household, but something of this sort is needed for every industry that asks to be hooked up to a municipal sewerage system. Otherwise the industrialist plays the Double C – Double P game and undermines the economy of the community that has invited him in.