IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/restud/v88y2021i2p610-642..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Self-enforcing Agreements and Forward Induction Reasoning

Author

Listed:
  • Emiliano Catonini

Abstract

In dynamic games, players may observe a deviation from a pre-play, possibly incomplete, non-binding agreement before the game is over. The attempt to rationalize the deviation may lead players to revise their beliefs about the deviator’s behaviour in the continuation of the game. This instance of forward induction reasoning is based on interactive beliefs about not just rationality, but also the compliance with the agreement itself. I study the effects of such rationalization on the self-enforceability of the agreement. Accordingly, outcomes of the game are deemed implementable by some agreement or not. Conclusions depart substantially from what the traditional equilibrium refinements suggest. A non-subgame perfect equilibrium outcome may be induced by a self-enforcing agreement, while a subgame perfect equilibrium outcome may not. The incompleteness of the agreement can be crucial to implement an outcome.

Suggested Citation

  • Emiliano Catonini, 2021. "Self-enforcing Agreements and Forward Induction Reasoning," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 88(2), pages 610-642.
  • Handle: RePEc:oup:restud:v:88:y:2021:i:2:p:610-642.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/restud/rdaa051
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Françoise Forges & József Sákovics, 2022. "Tenable threats when Nash equilibrium is the norm," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 51(3), pages 589-605, November.
    2. Mariann Ollar & Antonio Penta, 2021. "A network solution to robust implementation: The case of identical but unknown distributions," Economics Working Papers 1776, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
    3. Battigalli, P. & Catonini, E. & Manili, J., 2023. "Belief change, rationality, and strategic reasoning in sequential games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 527-551.
    4. Pierpaolo Battigalli & Emiliano Catonini, 2022. "The Epistemic Spirit of Divinity," Working Papers 681, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University.
    5. Maximilian Andres, 2024. "Equilibrium selection in infinitely repeated games with communication," CEPA Discussion Papers 75, Center for Economic Policy Analysis.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:restud:v:88:y:2021:i:2:p:610-642.. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://academic.oup.com/restud .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.