IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/pophec/v18y2019i3p264-281.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Inequality and inequity in the emergence of conventions

Author

Listed:
  • Calvin Cochran

    (University of California–Irvine, USA)

  • Cailin O’Connor

    (University of California–Irvine, USA)

Abstract

Many societies have norms of equity – that those who make symmetric social contributions deserve symmetric rewards. Despite this, there are widespread patterns of social inequity, especially along gender and racial lines. It is often the case that members of certain social groups receive greater rewards per contribution than others. In this article, we draw on evolutionary game theory to show that the emergence of this sort of convention is far from surprising. In simple cultural evolutionary models, inequity is much more likely to emerge than equity, despite the presence of stable, equitable outcomes that groups might instead learn. As we outline, social groups provide a way to break symmetry between actors in determining both contribution and reward in joint projects.

Suggested Citation

  • Calvin Cochran & Cailin O’Connor, 2019. "Inequality and inequity in the emergence of conventions," Politics, Philosophy & Economics, , vol. 18(3), pages 264-281, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:pophec:v:18:y:2019:i:3:p:264-281
    DOI: 10.1177/1470594X19828371
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1470594X19828371
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/1470594X19828371?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jevin D West & Jennifer Jacquet & Molly M King & Shelley J Correll & Carl T Bergstrom, 2013. "The Role of Gender in Scholarly Authorship," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(7), pages 1-6, July.
    2. Steven Pressman, 2002. "Explaining the Gender Poverty Gap in Developed and Transitional Economies," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(1), pages 17-40, March.
    3. Young H. P., 1993. "An Evolutionary Model of Bargaining," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 59(1), pages 145-168, February.
    4. Vincent Larivière & Chaoqun Ni & Yves Gingras & Blaise Cronin & Cassidy R. Sugimoto, 2013. "Bibliometrics: Global gender disparities in science," Nature, Nature, vol. 504(7479), pages 211-213, December.
    5. Axtell, R. & Epstein, J.M. & Young, H.P., 2000. "The Emergence of Classes in a Multi-Agent Bargaining Model," Papers 9, Brookings Institution - Working Papers.
    6. Jorgen W. Weibull, 1997. "Evolutionary Game Theory," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262731215, December.
    7. Nash, John, 1950. "The Bargaining Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 18(2), pages 155-162, April.
    8. Sara McLanahan & Irwin Garfinkel & Lynne Casper, 1994. "The Gender Poverty Gap: What Can We Learn From Other Countries?," LIS Working papers 112, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    9. Young, H Peyton, 1993. "The Evolution of Conventions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 61(1), pages 57-84, January.
    10. Edoardo Gallo, 2014. "Communication networks in markets," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 1431, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    11. Elvio Accinelli & Edgar J. Sánchez Carrera, 2010. "On evolutionarily stable strategies and replicator dynamics in asymmetric two-population games," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 1010, Department of Economics - dECON.
    12. repec:hhs:iuiwop:487 is not listed on IDEAS
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. H Peyton Young, 2014. "The Evolution of Social Norms," Economics Series Working Papers 726, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    2. Hwang, Sung-Ha & Rey-Bellet, Luc, 2021. "Positive feedback in coordination games: Stochastic evolutionary dynamics and the logit choice rule," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 355-373.
    3. Hwang, Sung-Ha & Lim, Wooyoung & Neary, Philip & Newton, Jonathan, 2018. "Conventional contracts, intentional behavior and logit choice: Equality without symmetry," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 273-294.
    4. Peyton Young, H., 1998. "Individual learning and social rationality1," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 42(3-5), pages 651-663, May.
    5. Khan, Abhimanyu, 2022. "Expected utility versus cumulative prospect theory in an evolutionary model of bargaining," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    6. Binmore, Ken & Samuelson, Larry & Young, Peyton, 2003. "Equilibrium selection in bargaining models," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 296-328, November.
    7. Wallace, Chris & Young, H. Peyton, 2015. "Stochastic Evolutionary Game Dynamics," Handbook of Game Theory with Economic Applications,, Elsevier.
    8. Jonathan Newton, 2018. "Evolutionary Game Theory: A Renaissance," Games, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-67, May.
    9. Jindani, Sam, 2022. "Learning efficient equilibria in repeated games," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 205(C).
    10. Giovanni Ponti & Robert M. Seymour, 1999. "Evolutionary Stability Of Inequality Structures," Rationality and Society, , vol. 11(1), pages 47-77, February.
    11. Sawa, Ryoji, 2021. "A prospect theory Nash bargaining solution and its stochastic stability," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 184(C), pages 692-711.
    12. Jean Louis Dessalles & Denis Phan, 2005. "Emergence in multi-agent systems:Cognitive hierarchy, detection, and complexity reduction," Computing in Economics and Finance 2005 257, Society for Computational Economics.
    13. Saez-Marti, Maria & Weibull, Jorgen W., 1999. "Clever Agents in Young's Evolutionary Bargaining Model," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 86(2), pages 268-279, June.
    14. Widgren, Mika & Napel, Stefan, 2003. "EU Conciliation Committee: Council 56 versus Parliament 6," CEPR Discussion Papers 4071, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    15. Weibull, Jörgen W., 1997. "What have we learned from Evolutionary Game Theory so far?," Working Paper Series 487, Research Institute of Industrial Economics, revised 26 Oct 1998.
    16. Christopher Cotton, 2005. "Can forgetful sellers be better off? Impact of information in an ultimatum price-setting game with learning," Game Theory and Information 0510007, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Khan, Abhimanyu, 2018. "Expected Utility Preferences versus Prospect Theory Preferences in Bargaining," MPRA Paper 89375, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Ennio Bilancini & Leonardo Boncinelli & Sebastian Ille & Eugenio Vicario, 2022. "Memory retrieval and harshness of conflict in the hawk–dove game," Economic Theory Bulletin, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 10(2), pages 333-351, October.
    19. Tom Johnston & Michael Savery & Alex Scott & Bassel Tarbush, 2023. "Game Connectivity and Adaptive Dynamics," Papers 2309.10609, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2023.
    20. Lin Zhang & Yuanyuan Shang & Ying Huang & Gunnar Sivertsen, 2022. "Gender differences among active reviewers: an investigation based on publons," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 127(1), pages 145-179, January.

    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:sae:pophec:v:18:y:2019:i:3:p:264-281. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.