The Smart Growth Debate: A Prisoner's Dilemma

The tedium associated with the ongoing debate between proponents of Smart Growth and its detractors can be argued in a more "rational" arena by placing the opposing perspectives in the context of the newly revived "Prisoner's Dilemma" as presented in last year's movie "A Beautiful Mind." Since the issue of personal choice is commonly bantered about in these circular arguments, why not make the final measurement via a zero-sum analysis.

The dilemma captures the net benefit of choice: if two prisoners, separated and interrogated, choose to cooperate by not ratting on one another, they will both benefit by obtaining a lighter sentence (e.g. 5 points each). If, however, one cooperates and the other does not, the latter wins (10 points) and the cooperator gets nailed (-10 points.) If they both rat on each other, they both go to jail for a long period of time, but the net sum is a wash (0 points).

Now I am but a simple planner, and do not purport to have this theory down pat, but I will present the first crack at the analysis in order to get the ball rolling.

First, let us make the two prisoners potential homeowners. Each is given the choice to either: a.) build a dream home with no capacity limitation with respect to land area and the amount of resources and infrastructure required; or b.) build a more modest dwelling that consumes less space and resources.

If both refuse to cooperate, which is the purported rational choice of the individual (because they stand to gain so much more), then the world would consist of immense, resource-intensive houses built over huge tracts of land. By Prisoner's Dilemma standards, this is a zero sum result with no benefit.

If one cooperates by building a modest house and the other opts to build a large mansion in the suburbs, then the defector wins by acquiring the goodwill of the former.

If they both cooperate, neither would have their dream house, yet both would experience a modest gain.

Thus the Prisoner's Dilemma illustrates unequivocally the benefits of cooperation over “selfishness." (Note that these terms are widely used by Dilemma theorists.)

In an effort to stir it up just a bit more, I wish to include in the debate the notion of sub-optimization: the theory that suggests the cooperative model only works in the long term since time is required to reveal the obvious benefits of cooperation. The theory purports that in the short term, the "rational" response is the "selfish" option simply because the net gain is so extraordinary and the benefits of the alternative are not apparent.

Therefore, I suggest that the Smart Growth planners have stepped forward as the interim guardians of the cooperative model while the fruits of cooperative labors are only fledgling. Once realized, the onerous, heavy handed regulations, guidelines and legally binding Official Community Plans that planners foist upon citizenry, may, eventually, fade into oblivion as citizens will naturally choose cooperation over selfishness, if for no other reason than the apparent zero-sum advantage.

Susan Hallatt works as a community planner for the transportation engineering firm Boulevard Transportation Group.