{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,18]],"date-time":"2026-04-18T18:15:18Z","timestamp":1776536118355,"version":"3.51.2"},"reference-count":64,"publisher":"Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences","issue":"26","content-domain":{"domain":["www.pnas.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A."],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2011,6,28]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>From group hunting to global warming, how to deal with collective action may be formulated in terms of a public goods game of cooperation. In most cases, contributions depend on the risk of future losses. Here, we introduce an evolutionary dynamics approach to a broad class of cooperation problems in which attempting to minimize future losses turns the risk of failure into a central issue in individual decisions. We find that decisions within small groups under high risk and stringent requirements to success significantly raise the chances of coordinating actions and escaping the tragedy of the commons. We also offer insights on the scale at which public goods problems of cooperation are best solved. Instead of large-scale endeavors involving most of the population, which as we argue, may be counterproductive to achieve cooperation, the joint combination of local agreements within groups that are small compared with the population at risk is prone to significantly raise the probability of success. In addition, our model predicts that, if one takes into consideration that groups of different sizes are interwoven in complex networks of contacts, the chances for global coordination in an overall cooperating state are further enhanced.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.1015648108","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2011,6,10]],"date-time":"2011-06-10T08:59:03Z","timestamp":1307696343000},"page":"10421-10425","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1073\/pnas.cm10313","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":233,"title":["Risk of collective failure provides an escape from the tragedy of the commons"],"prefix":"10.1073","volume":"108","author":[{"given":"Francisco C.","family":"Santos","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Departamento de Inform\u00e1tica and Centro de Intelig\u00eancia Artificial, Faculdade de Ci\u00eancias e Tecnologia, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 2829-516 Caparica, Portugal;"},{"name":"Applications of Theoretical Physics Group, Centro de Matem\u00e1tica e Aplica\u00e7\u00f5es Fundamentais, Instituto de Investiga\u00e7\u00e3o Interdisciplinar, P-1649-003 Lisbon Codex, Portugal; and"}]},{"given":"Jorge M.","family":"Pacheco","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Applications of Theoretical Physics Group, Centro de Matem\u00e1tica e Aplica\u00e7\u00f5es Fundamentais, Instituto de Investiga\u00e7\u00e3o Interdisciplinar, P-1649-003 Lisbon Codex, Portugal; and"},{"name":"Departamento de Matem\u00e1tica e Aplica\u00e7\u00f5es, Universidade do Minho, 4710-057 Braga, Portugal"}]}],"member":"341","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2011,6,9]]},"reference":[{"key":"e_1_3_2_1_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1126\/science.162.3859.1243"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_2_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.0800033105"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_3_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.0709546105"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_4_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.0504902103"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_5_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1093\/0199286094.001.0001"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_6_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1093\/acprof:oso\/9780199211890.001.0001"},{"key":"e_1_3_2_7_2","volume-title":"The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups","author":"Olson M","year":"1971","unstructured":"M Olson The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, Revised Version Ed. 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