The Tragedy of the Commons and arms races are both examples of social traps or multipolar traps where rational self-interested individual or state action creates globally suboptimal outcomes that are difficult to escape because any single agent that unilaterally constrains their behavior loses competitive advantage
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Speaker
Daniel SchottenbergerEvidence Quote
“a social trap is a term used in the social sciences quite a lot to indicate a coordination failure of this type where each agent pursuing their own near-term rational interest creates a situation that moves the entire Global situation long term to a suboptimal equilibria for everybody”
Created: 8/10/2026, 10:48:51 PM
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