Maybe not _those_ 8 rich people, but generally Western nations were made rich by exploiting the tragedy of the commons. Oil and other mining are the classic examples.
Why should we expect these poor, poor fishermen to prioritize our poor, poor planet over their poor, poor families when our own rich got that way through exploitation of natural resources and pollution?
I specifically mention the West because it is the West (the EU) who are pressuring the Philippines to better regulate their fishing industry, as per the fine article, and also because it is the West who are now comfortable enough to worry about the tragedy of the commons since they are done exploiting it.
Same's happening in many countries in Europe. I have a picture of my birth home, taken in 1903 from a nearby hill. The landscape is mostly bare, almost everything except the actual fields is used for cattle. Now you can't take a picture like that. Almost everything is covered by a forest, but you can't see it from the trees growing on the hill.
If climate changes - as it has changed in the Mediterranean, prior to industrialisation - that's then different.
> In the Philippines, stocks have declined precipitously. According to a report by the Philippine national statistics board, the average daily catch in 1970 was 45 pounds. By 2000, that had dropped to 4.5 pounds.