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Social Norms and the Evolution of Conditional Cooperation

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  • Spichtig, Mathias
  • Traxler, Christian

Abstract

This paper develops a model of social norms and cooperation in large societies. Within this framework we use an indirect evolutionary approach to study the endogenous formation of preferences and the coevolution of norm compliance. Thereby we link the multiplicity of equilibria, which emerges in the presence of social norms, to the evolutionary analysis: Individuals face situations where many others cooperate as well as situations where a majority free-rides. The evolutionary adaptation to such heterogenous environments will favor conditional cooperators, who condition their pro-social behavior on the others' cooperation. As conditional cooperators react flexibly to their social environment, they dominate free-riders as well as unconditional cooperators.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by University of Munich, Department of Economics in its series Discussion Papers in Economics with number 1398.

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Date of creation: Mar 2007
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Handle: RePEc:lmu:muenec:1398

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Related research

Keywords: Conditional Cooperation; Indirect Evolution; Social Norms; Heterogenous Environments;

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References

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  1. Friederike Mengel, 2006. "A Model Of Immigration, Integration And Cultural Transmission Of Social Norms," Working Papers. Serie AD 2006-08, Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, S.A. (Ivie).
  2. Noussair, C.N. & Masclet, D. & Tucker, S. & Villeval, M..C, 2003. "Monetary and non-monetary punishment in the voluntary contributions mechanism," Open Access publications from Tilburg University urn:nbn:nl:ui:12-377951, Tilburg University.
  3. Lindbeck, A & Nyberg, S & Weibull, J-W, 1997. "Social Norms and Economic Incentives in the Welfare State," Research Institute of Industrial Economics Working Papers 476, Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN).
  4. Mari Rege, 2004. "Social Norms and Private Provision of Public Goods," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 6(1), pages 65-77, 02.
  5. Keser, Claudia & van Winden, Frans, 2000. " Conditional Cooperation and Voluntary Contributions to Public Goods," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 102(1), pages 23-39, March.
  6. Bruno S. Frey & Stephan Meier, 2004. "Social Comparisons and Pro-social Behavior: Testing "Conditional Cooperation" in a Field Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(5), pages 1717-1722, December.
  7. Hirshlifer, David & Rassmusen, Eric, 1989. "Cooperation in a repeated prisoners' dilemma with ostracism," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 87-106, August.
  8. Guth, Werner, 1995. "An Evolutionary Approach to Explaining Cooperative Behavior by Reciprocal Incentives," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer, vol. 24(4), pages 323-44.
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Cited by:
  1. Bin Dong & Uwe Dulleck & Benno Torgler, 2008. "Conditional Corruption," CREMA Working Paper Series 2008-29, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).

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