Emergence of social inequality in the spatial harvesting of renewable public goods.

ABSTRACT: Spatially extended ecological public goods, such as forests, grasslands, and fish stocks, are at risk of being overexploited by selfish consumers-a phenomenon widely recognized as the 'tragedy of the commons.' The interplay of spatial and ecological dimensions introduces new features absent in non-spatial ecological contexts, such as consumer mobility, local information availability, and strategy evolution through social learning in neighborhoods. It is unclear how these features interact to influence the harvesting and dispersal strategies of consumers. To answer these questions, we develop and analyze an individual-based, spatially structured, eco-evolutionary model with explicit resource dynamics. We report the following findings. (1) When harvesting efficiency is low, consumers evolve

SUBMITTER: Joshi J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6974303 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature