TRAGEDY OF THE COMMON

Summary: The Tragedy of the Commons is an economic theory that describes how people often use
natural resources to their advantage without considering the good of a group or society as a whole. When
a number of individuals consider only their own welfare in this manner, it leads to negative outcomes for
everybody, as the natural resource becomes depleted.

In 1833, William Forster Lloyd wrote a short pamphlet detailing the concepts behind the economic theory
known as The Tragedy of the Commons. The contents of this pamphlet were mostly unknown until 1968,
when Garrett Hardin wrote an article in Science magazine that brought Lloyd’s work into the spotlight.

Understanding this economic theory requires a working definition of what is meant by “the commons."
“The commons" includes any natural resources that are not owned by an individual or corporation.
Rather, these resources are available for public use. This might include public pasture land, lumber, oil,
the oceans, the atmosphere, wildlife and fish, and many other common resources.

The Tragedy of the Commons describes how people often take advantage of resources that are freely
available to them. Often, they don’t consider the fact that if everyone over-uses the resource, this will
lead to negative effects for everyone, including themselves.

The famous example given by Hardin (1968) includes pastureland that people use to graze their cattle.
Herdsmen who operate under The Tragedy of the Commons don’t consider how excessive grazing or
adding additional cattle to their herd will impact other herdsman or everyone as a whole in the long run.
The more herdsman who only consider their own herd and profit, the more the pasture is run down and
the more all of the herds suffer. As Hardin (1968) put it, “Freedom in a commons brings ruin to all."

Rongxing Guo, in Cross-Border Resource Management (Third Edition), 2018

8.1.1 The Tragedy of the Commons

The tragedy of the commons can trace back to Aristotle, who noted that ‘what is common to the greatest
number has the least care bestowed upon it’ (See, for example, Feeny, Berkes, Mccay and Acheson (1990)
and Ostrom (1992, p. 30).). The tragedy of the commons refers to a dilemma described by Garrett Hardin,
which first published in the Science magazine in 1968 (Hardin, 1968). Central to Hardin’s essay is an
example which is a useful parable for understanding how over-exploitation can occur. This example was
based on Europe’s medieval land tenure, in which herders shared a common on which they were each
entitled to let their cows graze.

In Hardin’s example, each herder has an interest to put each succeeding cow he acquires onto the land,
even if the carrying capacity of the common is exceeded and it is permanently damaged for all as a result.
The herder receives all of the benefits from an additional cow, while the damage to the common is shared
by all the herders involved. If all herders are free to make their individually rational economic decision,
the common will be over-exploited or even destroyed eventually.

In the course of his analysis, Hardin develops the theme, drawing in many examples of present-day
commons, such as national parks, the atmosphere, oceans, rivers and fish stocks. Since then, there have
been a big stream of literature relating to this topic. For example, the example of fish stocks had led some
to call this the ‘tragedy of the fishers’ (Bowles, 2004, pp. 27–29). A major theme running through much of
the literature is the growth of human populations, with earth’s finite resources being the general
common:

Therein is the tragedy. Each man is locked into a system that compels him to increase his herd without
limit – in a world that is limited. Ruin is the destination toward which all men rush, each pursuing his own
interest in a society that believes in the freedom of the commons (Cited from Hardin (1968).).

MALTHUSIAN THEORY
The most well-known theory of population is the Malthusian theory. Thomas Robert Malthus wrote his
essay on “Principle of Population” in 1798 and modified some of his conclusions in the next edition in
1803.

The rapidly increasing population of England encouraged by a misguided Poor Law distressed him very
deeply.

He feared that England was heading for a disaster, and he considered it his solemn duty to warn his
country-men of impending disaster. He deplored “the strange contrast between over-care in breeding
animals and carelessness in breeding men.”

His theory is very simple. To use his own words: “By nature human food increases in a slow arithmetical
ratio; man himself increases in a quick geometrical ratio unless want and vice stop him.The increase in
numbers is necessarily limited by the means of subsistence Population invariably increases when the
means of subsistence increase, unless prevented by powerful and obvious checks.”

Malthus based his reasoning on the biological fact that every living organism tends to multiply to an
unimaginable extent. A single pair of thrushes would multiply into 19,500,000 after the life of the first pair
and 20 years later to 1,200,000,000,000,000,000,000 and if they stood shoulder to shoulder about one m
every 150,000 would be able to find a perching space on the whole surface of the globe! According to
Huxley’s estimate, the descendants of a single greenfly, if all survived and multiplied, would, at the end of
one summer, weigh down the population of China! Human beings are supposed to double every 25 years
and a couple can increase to the size of the present population in 1,750 years!

Such is the prolific nature of every specie. The power of procreation is inherent and insistent, and must
find expression. Cantillon says, “Men multiply like mice in a barn.” Production of food, on the other hand,
is subject to the law of diminishing returns. On the basis of these two premises, Malthus concluded that
population tended to outstrip the food supply. If preventive checks, like avoidance of marriage, later
marriage or less children per marriage, are not exercised, then positive checks, like war, famine and
disease, will operate.

The theory propounded by Malthus can be summed up in the following propositions:

(1) Food is necessary to the life of man and, therefore, exercises a strong check on population. In other
words, population is necessarily limited by the means of subsistence (i.e., food).

(2) Population increases faster than food production. Whereas population increases in geometric
progression, food production increases in arithmetic progression.
(3) Population always increases when the means of subsistence increase, unless prevented by some
powerful checks.

(4) There are two types of checks which can keep population on a level with the means of subsistence.
They are the preventive and a positive check.

The first proposition is that the population of a country is limited by the means of subsistence. In other
words, the size of population is determined by the availability of food. The greater the food production,
the greater the size of the population which can be sustained. The check of deaths caused by want of food
and poverty would limit the maximum possible population.

The second proposition states that the growth of population will out-run the increase in food production.
Malthus thought that man’s sexual urge to bear offspring knows no bounds. He seemed to think that there
was no limit to the fertility of man. But the power of land to produce food is limited. Malthus thought that
the law of diminishing returns operated in the field of agriculture and that the operation of this law
prevented food production from increasing in proportion to labour and capital invested in land.

In fact, Malthus observed that population would tend to increase at a geometric rate (2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64,
etc.), but food supply would tend to increase at an arithmetic rate (2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12). Thus, at the end of
two hundred years “population would be to the means of subsistence as 259 to 9; in three centuries as
4,096 to 13, and in two thousand years the difference would be incalculable.” Therefore, Malthus asserted
that population would ultimately outstrip food supply.

According to the third proposition, as the food supply in a country increases, the people will produce more
children and would have larger families. This would increase the demand for food and food per person
will again diminish. Therefore, according to Malthus, the standard of living of the people cannot rise
permanently. As regards the fourth proposition, Malthus pointed out that there were two possible checks
which could limit’ the growth of population: (a) Preventive checks, and (b) Positive checks.

Preventive Checks:

Preventive checks exercise their influence on the growth of population by bringing down the birth rate.
Preventive checks are those checks which are applied by man. Preventive checks arise from man’s fore-
sight which enables him to see distant consequences He sees the distress which frequently visits those
who have large families.

He thinks that with a large number of children, the standard of living of the family is bound to be lowered.
He may think that if he has to support a large family, he will have to subject himself to greater hardships
and more strenuous labour than that in his present state. He may not be able to give proper education to
his children if they are more in number.

Further, he may not like exposing his children to poverty or charity by his inability to provide for them.
These considerations may force man to limit his family. Late marriage and self-restraint during married
life are the examples of preventive checks applied by man to limit the family.

Positive Checks:
Positive checks exercise their influence on the growth of population by increasing the death rate. They
are applied by nature. The positive checks to population are various and include every cause, whether
arising from vice or misery, which in any degree contributes to shorten the natural duration of human life.

The unwholesome occupations, hard labour, exposure to the seasons, extreme poverty, bad nursing of
children, common diseases, wars, plagues and famines ire some of the examples of positive checks. They
all shorten human life and increase the death rate.

Malthus recommended the use of preventive checks if mankind was to escape from the impending misery.
If preventive checks were not effectively used, positive checks like diseases, wars and famines would come
into operation. As a result, the population would be reduced to the level which can be sustained by the
available quantity of food supply.

Criticism of Malthusian Theory:

The Malthusian theory of population has been a subject of keen contro-versy.

The following are some of the grounds on which it has been criticized:

(i) It is pointed out that Malthus’s pessimistic conclusions have not been borne out by the history of
Western European countries. Gloomy forecast made by Malthus about the economic conditions of future
generations of mankind has been falsified in the Western world. Population has not increased as rapidly
as predicted by Malthus; on the other hand, production has increased tremendous-ly because of the rapid
advances in technology. As a result, living standards of the people have risen instead of falling as was
predicted by Malthus.

(ii) Malthus asserted that food production would not keep pace with population growth owing to the
operation of the law of diminishing returns in agriculture. But by making rapid advances in technology and
accumulating capital in larger quantity, advanced countries have been able to postpone the stage of
diminishing returns. By making use of fertilizers, pesticide better seeds, tractors and other agricultural
machinery, they have been able to increase their production greatly.

In fact, in most of the advanced countries the rate of increase of food production has been much greater
than the rate of population growth. Even in India now, thanks to the Green Revolution, the increase in
food production is greater than the increase in population. Thus, inventions and improvements in the
methods of production have belied the gloomy forecast of Malthus by holding the law of diminishing
returns in check almost indefinitely.

(iii) Malthus compared the population growth with the increase in food production alone. Malthus held
that because land was available in limited quantity, food production could not rise faster than population.
But he should have considered all types of production in considering the question of optimum size of
population. England did feel the shortage of land and food.

If England had been forced to support her population entirely from her own soil, there can be little doubt
that England would have experienced a series of famines by which her growth of population would have
been checked.But England did not experience such a disaster. It is because England industrialized itself by
developing her natural resources other than land like coal and iron, and accumulating man-made capital
equipment like factories, tools, machinery, mines, ships and railways, this enabled her to produce plenty
of industrial and manufacturing goods which she then exported in exchange for food-stuffs from foreign
countries.

There is no food problem in Great Britain. Therefore, Malthus made a mistake in taking agricultural land
and food production alone into account when discussing the population question. As already said, he
should have rather considered all types of production.

(iv) Malthus held that the increase in the means of subsistence or food supplies would cause population
to grow rapidly so that ultimately means of subsistence or food supply would be in level with population,
and everyone would get only bare minimum subsistence. In other words, according to Malthus, living
standards of the people cannot rise in the long run above the level of minimum subsistence. But, as
already pointed out, living standards of the people in the Western world have risen greatly and stand
much above the minimum subsistence level.

There is no evidence of birth-rate rising with the increases in the standard of living. Instead, there is
evidence that birth-rates fall as the economy grows. In Western countries, attitude towards children
changed as they developed economically. Parents began to feel that it was their duty to do as much as
they could for each child.

Therefore, they preferred not to have more children than they could attend to properly. People now
began to care more for maintaining a higher standard of living rather than for bearing more children. The
wide use of contraceptives in the Western world brought down the birth rates. This change in the attitude
towards children and the wide use of contraceptives in the Western world has falsified Malthusian
doctrine.

(v) Malthus gave no proof of his assertion that population increased exactly in geometric progression and
food production increased exactly in arithmetic progression. It has been rightly pointed out that
population and food supply do not change in accordance with these mathematical series. Growth of
population and food supply cannot be expected to show the precision or accuracy of such series.

However, Malthus, in later editions of his book, did not insist on these mathematical terms and only held
that there was an inherent tendency in population to outrun the means of subsistence. We have seen
above that even this is far from true.

There is no doubt that the civilized world has kept the population in check. It is, however, to be regretted
that population has been increasing at the wrong end. The poor people, who can ill-afford to bring up and
educate children, are multiplying, whereas the rich are applying breaks on the increase of the size of their
families.

Is Malthusian Theory Valid Today?

We must, however, add that though the gloomy conclusions of Malthus have not turned out to be true
due to several factors which have made their appearance only in recent times, yet the essentials of the
theory have not been demolished. He said that unless preventive checks were exercised, positive checks
would operate. This is true even today. The Malthusian theory fully applies in India.

We are at present in that unenviable position which Malthus feared. We have the highest birth-rate and
the highest death-rate in the world. Grinding poverty, ever-recurring epidemics, famine and communal
quarrels are the order of the day. We are deficient in food supply.
Our standard of living is incredibly low. Who can say that Malthus was not a true prophet, if not for his
country, at any rate for the Asiatic countries like India, Pakistan and China? No wonder that intense family
planning drive is on in India at present.

The Malthusian Model

The Malthusian theory inspired by Malthus (1798)14, suggests that the worldwide stagnation in income
per capita over this epoch reflected the counterbalancing effect of population growth on the expansion
of resources, in an environment characterized by diminishing returns to labor. The expansion of resources,
according to Malthus, led to an increase in population growth, reflecting the natural result of the “passion
between the sexes”. In contrast, when population size grew beyond the capacity sustainable by available
resources, it was reduced by the “preventive check” (i.e., intentional reduction of fertility) as well as by
the “positive check” (i.e., the tool of nature due to malnutrition, disease, war and famine).

According to the theory, periods marked by the absence of changes in the level of technology or in the
availability of land, were characterized by a stable population size as well as a constant income per capita.
In contrast, episodes of technological progress, land expansion, and favorable climatic conditions, brought
about temporary gains in income per capita, triggering an increase in the size of the population, which led
eventually to a decline in income per capita to its long-run level. Due to the positive adjustment of
population to an increase in income per capita, differences in technologies or in land productivity across
countries resulted in cross-country variations in population density rather than in

CARRYING CAPACITY
Carrying capacity is a quantitative concept that assumes the limit, though difficult to estimate, of the
ability of natural ecosystem to support continued growth of population within the limit of abundance of
resource and within the tolerance of environmental degradation.

Mohammad Ali PhD, in Sustainability Assessment, 2013

2.3.2 Carrying Capacity

Carrying capacity is a quantitative concept that assumes the limit, though difficult to estimate, of the
ability of natural ecosystem to support continued growth of population within the limit of abundance of
resource and within the tolerance of environmental degradation. The size of population that the carrying
capacity of a resource system can support mainly depends on the size of the needs of that population.
The size of the need cannot exceed the limit of carrying capacity to maintain sustainability. Although the
definition of carrying capacity has been forwarded from natural science, its orientation to the needs of
population converts it to very much related to management and policy issues. Key factors for manipulating
needs are population number and density, affluence and technology, depletion rate of renewable and
nonrenewable resources, and the build up of hazardous wastes in the environment. Therefore,
understanding the carrying capacity concept is important for formulating sustainable policy.

While carrying capacity is relevant to natural condition of resource, environment, and communities
present in the system, human beings’ can influence the carrying capacity of a system significantly through
harvesting resources of their interest and through maintaining the relationship among the communities
present in the system. How the system will continue largely depends on how the human being treats the
system for the derivatives of his/her own well-being. The comparative assessment of carrying capacity
over a spatial and temporal scale determines human beings approaches to the system. Because policies
regulate the attitude of human beings to a particular system, thereby comparative assessment of carrying
capacity is likely to provide information on the nature of influences of policies on resource sustainability.

RIVER CONTINUUM
The River Continuum Concept (Vannote et al. 1980) is a scientific framework for describing the predictable
ways in which flowing ecosystems are expected to change spatially. For example, small headwaters are
naturally different from large deltas. These differences extend beyond appearance to the very function of
food webs and the species comprising aquatic communities. Changes may appear categorical, but actually
occur gradually, along a continuum. Not all streams fit the river continuum models, but even so, the River
Continuum Concept is the most common framework used to discuss how these streams deviate from
expectations. This is an important concept for biological monitoring for many reasons. Among these
reasons is the fact that many impairments or disturbances cause streams to behave differently than
expected according to the River Continuum Concept (Vannote et al. 1980).

Abstract

From headwaters to mouth, the physical variables within a river system present a continuous gradient of
physical conditions. This gradient should elicit a series of responses within the constituent populations
resulting in a continuum of biotic adjustments and consistent patterns of loading, transport, utilization,
and storage of organic matter along the length of a river. Based on the energy equilibrium theory of fluvial
geomorphologists, we hypothesize that the structural and functional characteristics of stream
communities are adapted to conform to the most probable position or mean state of the physical system.
We reason that producer and consumer communities characteristic of a given river reach become
established in harmony with the dynamic physical conditions of the channel. In natural stream systems,
biological communities can be characterized as forming a temporal continuum of synchronized species
replacements. This continuous replacement functions to distribute the utilization of energy inputs over
time. Thus, the biological system moves towards a balance between a tendency for efficient use of energy
inputs through resource partitioning (food, substrate, etc.) and an opposing tendency for a uniform rate
of energy processing throughout the year. We theorize that biological communities developed in natural
streams assume processing strategies involving minimum energy loss. Downstream communities are
fashioned to capitalize on upstream processing inefficiencies. Both the upstream inefficiency (leakage)
and the downstream adjustments seem predictable. We propose that this River Continuum Concept
provides a framework for integrating predictable and observable biological features of lotic systems.
Implications of the concept in the areas of structure, function, and stability of riverine ecosystems are
discussed.

BIOPHILIA
E.O. Wilson and the biophilia hypothesis

What is biophilia? Wilson calls biofilia “innate tendency to focus on life and lifelike processes“ (Wilson
1984, p. 1), “innate emotional affiliation of human beings to other living organisms“ (Wilson 1993,
p. 31) or „inborn affinity human beings have for other forms of life, an affiliation evoked, according
to circumstances, by pleasure, or a sense of security, or awe, or even fascination blended with revulsion“
(Wilson 1994, p. 360).
If Wilson speaks about an innate tendency, he means by that that the structure of our brains at least
partially at the time of birth contains certain basic mental facilities, that develop with contact with the
external environment in a somewhat predictable fashion. If he speaks about tendencies “to focus,”
or “to affiliate emotionally” he means by that that humans use certain cognitive rules, which
influence what, under what conditions, and how something will be perceived, how the given sensation
will be worked with, stored and called up from memory. Innate cognitive rules in animals are common,
as they use them for correctly identifying and imprinting biologically significant elements of the
social environment (e.g. the appearance of their parents, or partner) as well as the species specific
environment (habitat selection). Cognitive tendencies appear at different ages and are situationally
and functionally specific. Wilson named them epigenetic rules of mental development, i.e. both the
genetic predisposition and the environment, contribute to them. The existence of similar rules
directing cognition for survival-related specifically human elements of the environment is assumed for
humans as well (Wilson 1993). In the biophilia hypothesis Wilson concentrates on the fact that the
creation of the human cognition “pattern” during the process of evolution was not contributed to by
only the abiotic, and/or social environment, but also the biotic, i.e. other organisms.

In the first listed definition from the book Biophilia (Wilson 1984) it is claimed that the human mind is
generally focused on “life and lifelike processes”. Wilson views life on Earth materially – the first
self-replicating entities originated on Earth 3.5 billion years ago. All organisms come from one ancestor
and share the genetic code and basic biochemical processes in the cell. On these shared bases the current
biodiversity of metabolisms and forms developed through natural selection, i.e. a process
accumulating and sorting slight changes caused by mutations. In the biophilia hypothesis Wilson indicates
that the phylogeny of life on Earth is reflected in the structure of the human mind. In his opinion the
human mind must be looked at as one of the parts of the biosphere developing in mutual correlation
with its individual elements. The history of life on Earth is projected into our understanding of the
environment and the perception of our existence. Wilson claims that our mind makes use of a phylogenic
memory, which is passed on from generation to generation and potentially comes from human ancestors.
Thus, biophilia can be understood as “inborn affiliation with the rest of life” i.e. the sense of phylogenic
relationship with all life on Earth. Defined like that it has its place within the evolutionary theory of the
biosphere (Vernadsky, Lovelock and Margulis).

According to the other two definitions the concept of biophilia can be understood to be “inborn focus on
other life forms”, that is a complex of cognitive evolutionary modifications of the human mind, which
directs learning relationships to natural phenomena. It developed under prehistoric sociocultural
and natural conditions. This is how evolutionary psychologists or human ethologists, anthropologists
and sociobiologists understand biophilia. It is a complex, or set, of instincts (Wilson 2002, p. 137), which
sometime in the evolutionary past of humankind favored the individual at some level of natural selection.
This manifests itself in unconscious and/or irrational reactions to various natural phenomena. These
reactions can be considered proximate manifestations of ultimate causes e.g. avoiding danger (reactions
to snakes and wolves, the preference of landscapes offering look-out points and hiding places, etc.) or
finding food (the preference of species-rich systems, being tuned in to warm colored flowers and fruit).

In his arguments Wilson does not only point out the innate rules of perception concerning organisms,
but also higher ecological units – habitats or the entire landscape. It is likely that as an evolutionary
ecologist, he understands life forms mainly within their ecological relationships to the abiotic and biotic
environment; the organism is thus more of an “organism in an ecosystem”. The innate tendency to
react to a life form, such as for example a bear, does not have to be set off only by the physical presence
of a bear, but also its species-specific niche: traits of ecosystems in which it lives, i.e. forest or tundra
habitats, furthermore specific habitats where it feeds and sleeps the most often, i.e. heaths and
blueberry patches and then of course physicals signs which the surrounding ecosystem bears of the
physical presence of a bear – a deer that has been taken down, torn up tree trunks, torn up blueberry
patches surrounded by bear droppings, etc.

Wilson assumes that the human mind reflects and models the external world with the help of a node-
link structure. The nodes contain concepts (dog, flight, blood, etc.), but also certain process labels in the
form of emotions – together they form the contents of a certain symbol. Connecting the concepts
together and their connection to calling up various emotions was adaptive, for it served to teach
adequate reactions to important stimuli (Wilson 1984, p. 85). Most concepts however came out in
various symbols. For example the concept of bear is connected with concepts representing signs of its
niche and these may be connected to concepts of other important natural phenomena participating
in human selection. Connection of variously emotionally colored concepts in individual nodes results in a
strongly ambivalent relationship to most natural elements.

The consequent rules for relating with and treating the non-human world form in every individual
during the process of enculturation, during which the innate and individual meet with specific
traditions. Epigenetic rules are applied in various societies in connection to the specific nature of using
the environment. The given sociocultural system can make some selection forces inoperable (e.g. via the
change in technology). Wilson however claims that deeply stored concepts derived from nature stay in
us and cultural history only changes their meaning or connection to other concepts, it only assigns
them with a different logical sign (Wilson 1994, p. 154).

The original cognitive rules of understanding and dealing with nature have not disappeared even in
today’s world of artificial artifacts, in which we can only difficultly find natural stimuli. Biophilia, as
a complex of weak rules of learning, influences our thinking about nature, the landscape and even about
art, myths and environmental ethics. The deeply ingrained cognitive rules have in Western society
manifested themselves, for example, in the popularity of zoos, preferential housing on hills with views
of water or in phobias (Wilson 1984, p. 32). Many of them are fundamentally connected to avoiding
danger or motivation for exploring and exploiting the environment. In traditional societies these
biophilic tendencies are functional, as humans there use their environment directly; the exploration goes
hand in hand with identifying with other organisms and perceiving and respecting the relationships
within the ecosystem. In Western civilization with humans’ technical capabilities these tendencies
however overload nature; they are not correctly reflected in culture and thus they are not even
functional. Many of today’s rules for treating nature/other species is the result of a long history of
intimate contact with nature and the short period of mechanization of our environment, which has
reduced this contact and at the same time greatly changed the way we view the value of other species
(Wilson 1975a).

DOCTRINE OF HARD LOOK

Hard-Look Doctrine is a principle of Administrative law that says a court should carefully review an
administrative-agency decision to ensure that the agencies have genuinely engaged in reasoned decision
making. A court is required to intervene if it “becomes aware, especially from a combination of danger
signals, that the agency has not really taken a ‘hard look’ at the salient problems.” The Administrative
Procedure Act instructs federal courts to invalidate agency decisions that are “arbitrary” or “capricious.”
Close judicial scrutiny helps to discipline agency decisions and to constrain the illegitimate exercise of
discretion. The hard look doctrine is simply a reflection of the courts' view of how an effective and
meaningful process of judicial review should be conducted.

THEORY ON STANDSTILL OR NON-AGRESSION

Stand Still Theory of Murray:

Theories based on the concept of non-subsid-ence or stand-still situation of land fall in two catego-ries.
According to first group corals grow upon suit-able stable submarine platforms with unchanging sea level
while according to the second group necessary suitable submarine platforms become available due to
lowering of sea-level and consequent erosion of land by sea-waves but the land always remains stable.
The theory of Murray belongs to the first group.

Murray propounded his theory of the formation of coral reefs in the year 1880 on the basis of the
information received during the Challenger Expedi-tions (1872-76). According to him coral polyps can live
upto the depth of 30 fathoms (180 feet). Sea-level and submarine platforms are stable. Several submarine
platforms, volcanic peaks, islands are present below sea-level.

If the submarine land platforms are above the permissible depth for the survival of coral polyps (180 feet)
they are subjected to wave erosion so that their heights are lowered down. On the other hand, if the
submarine platforms are below the required depth of sea of 180 feet, their height is increased due to
deposi-tion of marine sediments. After getting suitable foun-dation at required depth of 180 feet coral
polyps begin to grow upward along the coasts and fringing reef is formed.

The coral polyps after some time also grow outward on the foundation of their own debris. Thus, the
continuously outward growing fringing reef is transformed into barrier reef in due course of time. The
lagoon is formed between the land and barrier reef because of dissolution of dead corals. Atolls are
formed due to outward growth of corals in all directions at the top of submarine platforms.

Thus, a ring of coral reef is formed around the solution lagoon (fig. 30.6). Ac-cording to Murray the lagoon-
ward side of atoll is characterized by dead corals while the seaward side has living corals which
continuously grow outward. The dead corals are gradually dissolved and thus the lagoon is continuously
widened. The lagoons also become shallower because of deposition of dissolved dead corals.

Formation of Coral Reefs according to Murray

Evaluation of the Theory:

The non-subsidence theory of Murray acclaimed wide popularity in the beginning but later on it was
severely criticised on the following grounds:

(1) Murray’s theory requires the existence of numerous suitable submarine platforms the depth of 180
feet but the existence of such features is not possible.

(2) Murray has described two contradictory views of marine erosion and deposition at the depth of 30
fathoms (180 feet) at the same time over different submarine peaks. Such proposition is not possible.
(3) A limit of 30 fathoms for deposition and erosion cannot be accepted.

(4) According to Murray, the lagoon is formed due to solution of dead corals. This mechanism is also
doubtful because if the lagoon may be formed due to solution of corals, the pelagic deposits laid down on
the submarine platforms or peaks would also be dissolved.

(5) If the land or submarine platforms and peaks are stable then the lagoons would be completely filled
up with the marine sediments and thus the lagoons would disappear.

(6) According to Murray coral reefs cannot be found beyond the depth of 30 fathoms but these have also
been found at greater depths.

EPISTOLARY JURISDICTION
Justice Leonen: In G.R. No. 180771, petitioners Resident Marine Mammals allegedly bring their case in
their personal capacity, alleging that they stand to benefit or be injured from the judgment on the issues.
The human petitioners implead themselves in a representative capacity "as legal guardians of the lesser
life-forms and as responsible stewards of God's Creations." They use Oposa v. Factoran, Jr. as basis for
their claim, asserting their right to enforce international and domestic environmental laws enacted for
their benefit under the concept of stipulation pour autrui. As the representatives of Resident Marine
Mammals, the human petitioners assert that they have the obligation to build awareness among the
affected residents of Tañon Strait as well as to protect the environment, especially in light of the
government's failure, as primary steward, to do its duty under the doctrine of public trust.

Resident Marine Mammals and the human petitioners also assert that through this case, this court will
have the opportunity to lower the threshold for locus standi as an exercise of "epistolary jurisdiction."
(G.R. No. 180771; April 21, 2015)

http://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in: People of India have the right to life and personal liberty under Article
21. Justice is the basic foundation on which dignified and meaningful life is rested. Further the Apex Court
has held that justice should be speedy and inexpensive otherwise it offends Article 21. Therefore, Judiciary
has constitutional obligation to deliver speedy and cheap justice. Judiciary in late 20th century has
invented the devise of Public Interest Litigation (herein after refereed to as PIL) which has become a main
weapon in the armory to deliver speedy justice at affordable costs. Further judiciary has adopted new
kinds of procedural techniques while dealing with PIL. Many technical rules of procedure have been
relaxed; the burden of the individual in fighting the litigation is reduced by various beneficial principles.
Acting on letters written by or on behalf of the oppressed people is a strategy adopted by the Supreme
Court for facilitating access to justice. This is known as ‘epistolary jurisdiction.’ The letters have been
converted into writ petitions on the logic that Article 32 of the Constitution does not say as to “who” shall
have the right to move the Supreme Court, nor does it say by “what” proceedings. The expression
“appropriate proceedings” is too wide, and so moving the court through a letter can be appropriate
proceedings because it would not be right to expect a person acting pro bono public to incur expenses
from his pocket for having a regular writ petition prepared by a lawyer. It has to be appropriate not in
terms of any particular form, but appropriate with reference to the purpose of the proceeding. (Epistolary
Jurisdiction, Pages 1 and 2)