Ninety-two years ago, on this day, August 7th, 1933 Elinor Olstrom was born.
Elinor Claire “Lin” Ostrom (née Awan; August 7, 1933 – June 12, 2012) was an American political scientist and political economist[1][2][3] whose work was associated with New Institutional Economics and the resurgence of political economy.[4] In 2009, she was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for her “analysis of economic governance, especially the commons“, which she shared with Oliver E. Williamson; she was the first woman to win the prize.[5]
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 308ppm. As of 2025, when this post was published, it is 430ppm. This matters because the more carbon dioxide in the air, the more heat gets trapped. The more heat, the more extreme weather events. You can make it more complicated than that if you want, but really, it’s not. Fwiw, I have a tattoo of the Keeling Curve on my left forearm.
What I think we can learn from Ostrom. Governance of common goods (it IS possible, it has been done). Garrett “Tragedy of the Commons” Hardin was not merely extremely racist but extremely racist and wrong.
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
Also on this day:
August 7, 1979 – Cabinet Office wonk hopes to pacify greenies
August 7, 1995 – decent Australian journo reports on utter bullshit #climate economic “modelling”
August 7, 2003 – John Howard meets with business buddies to kill climate action