Why Environmental Zero-Sum Games Are Real

• Author: J.B. Ruhl and James Salzman
• Pages: 1-10

1

Chapter 1

Why Environmental

Zero-Sum Games Are Real

J.B. Ruhl and James Salzman

Politicians and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) love to talk

about the glossy world of “win-win scenarios” in the environmental

eld. Battling climate change will grow the renewables sector and

create thousands of green jobs. Catch share programs will increase the sh-

ing community’s incomes and also conserve sheries. Energy conservation

saves fuel bills and drives eciency improvements. Famed Harvard Business

School Prof. Michael Porter even hypothesized that countries with stricter

environmental regulations are more competitive in the global marketplace.

Choose the slogan—“Environmental protection is not only a good thing to

do, it’s good for you!” or “You can do well by doing good!”

e win-win theme has become pervasive in environmental rhetoric.

Indeed, in Nonzero: e Logic of Human Destiny,1 Robert Wright oers a

sweeping view of human evolution that culminates in his argument that

modern society has become so complex and interconnected that there are no

true “zero-sum” games to be played between people or institutions. While

an attractive proposition at the general level, in this chapter we push back

and argue that from the perspec tive of the lived experience and local politics,

zero-sum games are not only present in environmental policy, but unfor-

tunately frequent. Indeed, the dynamics of environmental protection make

zero-sum scenarios particularly challenging. As a result, a number of strate-

gies have developed—whether nancial, rhetorical, or regulatory—that seek

to soften the impact on losers or change their perception of the unfairness of

their loss.

Economists and game theorists use the zero-sum game concept to

describe a situation in which each participant’s gain (or loss) of util-

ity is exactly balanced by the losses (or gains) of the utility of the other

participant(s). In a very real sense, this equilibrium is where markets are

driving participants. When buyers and sellers haggle in the bazaar, they

1. R W, N: T L  H D (1999).