Noun
A set of circumstances in which one phenomenon (such as a group of people) opposes or undermines another phenomenon that produces or sustains it (for example, peasants deforesting hillsides in order to expand cultivatable land, resulting in flooding and the loss of the same).
(psychology) The tendency to increase ones value of or commitment to something when it involves unanticipated negative side effects.
Source: en.wiktionary.org