A Way Out From the Wrongful Environmental Mindset: The Origins and Possible Solutions to the Tragedy of the Commons
Philosophy and Practice of Sustainable Development (
2013)
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Abstract
The paper indicates and discusses three phenomena identified as the main origins of the mindset responsible for the tragedy of the global commons, namely (1) Cornucopianism, (2) rationality of self-interest and egoism, and (3) the presupposed instrumental value of nature. It is demonstrated that all those theses can be philosophically and ethically dismissed and thus, the wrongful environmental mindset built around them should be rejected.
It is further argued that the up-to-date solutions to the tragedy are unsatisfactory. Moreover, the tragedy of the commons can be fully resolved only by rethinking the philosophical constituents of the environmental mindset, rejecting superfluous aspects of it, and construct a new one, which seeds exists already in a form of global citizenship identity.