Environmental policy is an arena characterized by extremes. On one hand, there are calls to take decisive, global action to resolve daunting environmental problems. Global climate change potentially threatens billions of people. Many fisheries around the world are collapsing (Worm et al. 2006). Groundwater in many areas is being overexploited, and some scholars predict that water quality and depletion problems will become more acute and widespread (Shah et al. 2001). Deforestation continues at rapid rates across parts of the developing world, and air pollution poses health problems for people in industrializing economies (Miettinen et al. 2011; Ravindra et al. 2016). On the other hand, there are those who argue that some concerns are not as serious as they may seem, or that the economic and social impacts of environmental policy are too severe (Lomborg 2001). Regardless of one's view on the seriousness of any particular environmental problem, it is an undeniable fact that any proposed solution will have a cost. Both natural resources and the resources it takes to resolve environmental problems are scarce. Putting resources into addressing one environmental concern often means diverting them from other uses, including potentially from the resolution of other environmental problems. Consequently the decision as to whether or not the benefits of an environmental policy justify the cost thus represent an inevitable trade-off that demands serious consideration. These tradeoffs could include unintended consequences of misguided or poorly implemented policies, population control measures that impinge on human rights, and attempts to avoid potential environmental consequences that could wind up disproportionately harming the poor (Lewison et al. 2019; Hampton 2003; Bruegge et al. 2019).

The result of this tension is that environmental policy discussions can become more of a battle between two warring factions than a collaborative effort to understand the full complexities of the situation, taking seriously both the health of the environment and our world's natural resources while also taking seriously the human and social impact. However, as has been seen in earlier chapters, the Bloomington school is not generally inclined to extremes of any sort. Elinor Ostrom and Vincent Ostrom rejected dichotomies, including the belief – false, in their view – that complicated issues like environmental resource management can be resolved through easily identifiable, single-best solutions.