Jim Devine wrote:
It's a market failure as we
of the Econ tribe typically
use the term: a deviation of
the real-world market from the
idealized Walrasian world.
I don't think that's the way economists understand a market failure.
A market failure is the inability of a market proper (i.e. with duly
stipulated private-ownership rights) to turn out an optimal or
efficient allocation.
The "tragedy of the commons" is the exact opposite. It's an argument
against communism. It's about the inefficiency of communism. So,
obviously, the "neoclassicals" don't need to respond to it.
A Marxist response to this argument is, however, implicit in Gotha.
The mode of distribution cannot be ahead of the mode of production.
The mode of distribution cannot be ahead of the level of
public-mindedness of the producers. Etc. The evolution of them all
is, well, dialectical.
It's not semantics.