Collective action problem are found in a variety of settings. One important setting in environmental policy. Consider the example of recycling. Most people recognize that recycling is good for the environment, and that a better environment benefits all off us. Nonetheless, each individual reaps the benefits of other people recycling irrespective of whether or not they themselves do so; hence they can gain the rewards without paying any costs. What is more, the contribution of any individual to the overall benefits of everyone recycling is statistically rather low; hence the amount of benefits each individual reaps are almost wholly unaffected by whether or not they recycle. In both these respects, recycling is a clear case where the rational strategy for each individual is to do nothing and try to reap the rewards o other doing something. Yet if everyone acted rationally, the result would be that nobody would recycle and the quality of the environment would decline. Clearly, the same type of collective action problem occurs with many kinds of environmental goods from the local level to the global level.