Culture, part 2: Redlight

Another pair of concepts I found myself going back to is that of the ‘Tragedy of the Commons’, and the ‘Prisoner’s Dilemma’; two similar but slightly nuanced concepts. The tragedy of the commons implies that when there is a common resource (and a resource could be a multitude of things) it is in each person’s own personal best interest to exploit that common resource as much as possible. You see, if there were a limited number of fish in the sea, and everyone were to limit themselves, the resource would last, and everyone would benefit. However, everyone exploited the resource, it would soon be depleted.

Now if an individual were to look at the situation, it is in that one person’s best interest to defect from the common good and fish as much as possible because if they exploit the fish and everyone else does not, they come out better, and if they exploit it but everyone else does, well then they at least got it while the getting’ was good. If he or she doesn’t exploit the fish, then they either get the same as everyone else (not more) or they don’t exploit it while everyone else does and they get very little.

The prisoner’s dilemma is similar. It’s basically this: if you’re a prisoner and you have a chance to escape, but know that the guards would certainly execute everyone if they discovered someone had escaped, it is in your best interest to try to escape. You see, if there are other prisoner’s, they too will know this, so they will try to escape. If one person tries to escape but no others do, then one gets free but all the others suffer the consequences. If they all escape, then they all go free, but in either case, it’s always better to be trying to escape, whether or not anyone else is.

The best (and personally the most infuriating) example I can give you of this in Liberia is the ‘busy intersection’ example. Traffic laws in Liberia, are the same as or worse than most developing countries: all but non-existent. With poor roads, no stoplights, and too many vehicles on the road, backed up intersections are common. Insert our aforementioned concepts: the intersection, in Redlight for example (an ironic name for the intersection, given that there is no longer a stop (red) light there and that it is the most notorious intersection in the country), was designed to have one lane going in and out in each of the three intersecting roads.

If everyone waits their turn, everyone will progress at a slow, but moderate (and fair) pace. However, one driver decides to drive on the shoulder and pass everyone else (you’ve seen this on the freeways of North America too. They get ahead, while the rest of us suckers stay behind. Unfortunately, when that car ultimately gets to the intersection, they have to merge once again which slows down the entire progression. Eventually, you get thee lanes of traffic entering the intersection from each of the three directions, and less than one lane exiting the intersection because of all of the cars taking over and blocking the outgoing traffic…. so we all sit in our cars, breath in diesel fumes, honk the horn, and mutter impolite words under our breath, or out loud.

[the solution: drive a motorcycle, and avoid the situation entirely]