IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/compec/v28y2006i4p399-420.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Evolutionary Dynamics in Public Good Games

Author

Listed:
  • Christiane Clemens
  • Thomas Riechmann

Abstract

This paper explores the question whether boundedly rational agents learn to behave optimally when asked to voluntarily contribute to a public good. The dynamic game is described by an Evolutionary Algorithm, which is shown to extend the applicability of ordinary replicator dynamics of evolutionary game theory to problem sets characterized by finite populations and continuous strategy spaces. We analyze the learning process of purely and impurely altruistic agents and find in both cases the contribution level to converge towards the Nash equilibrium. The group size, the degree of initial heterogeneity and the propensity to experiment are key factors of the learning process. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, Inc. 2006

Suggested Citation

  • Christiane Clemens & Thomas Riechmann, 2006. "Evolutionary Dynamics in Public Good Games," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 28(4), pages 399-420, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:compec:v:28:y:2006:i:4:p:399-420
    DOI: 10.1007/s10614-006-9044-4
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s10614-006-9044-4
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10614-006-9044-4?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
    ---><---

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

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mark Isaac, R. & McCue, Kenneth F. & Plott, Charles R., 1985. "Public goods provision in an experimental environment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 51-74, February.
    2. Miller, John H. & Andreoni, James, 1991. "Can evolutionary dynamics explain free riding in experiments?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 9-15, May.
    3. Varian, Hal R., 1994. "Sequential contributions to public goods," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 165-186, February.
    4. Dixit, Avinash & Olson, Mancur, 2000. "Does voluntary participation undermine the Coase Theorem?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 309-335, June.
    5. Andreoni, James, 1988. "Privately provided public goods in a large economy: The limits of altruism," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 57-73, February.
    6. Andreoni, James, 1990. "Impure Altruism and Donations to Public Goods: A Theory of Warm-Glow Giving?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 100(401), pages 464-477, June.
    7. Metcalfe, J S, 1994. "Competition, Fisher's Principle and Increasing Returns in the Selection Process," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 4(4), pages 327-346, November.
    8. Sugden, Robert, 1985. "Consistent conjectures and voluntary contributions to public goods: why the conventional theory does not work," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 117-124, June.
    9. Chris Birchenhall & Nikos Kastrinos & Stan Metcalfe, 1997. "Genetic algorithms in evolutionary modelling," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 7(4), pages 375-393.
    10. Fershtman, Chaim & Nitzan, Shmuel, 1991. "Dynamic voluntary provision of public goods," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 35(5), pages 1057-1067, July.
    11. Gale, John & Binmore, Kenneth G. & Samuelson, Larry, 1995. "Learning to be imperfect: The ultimatum game," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 56-90.
    12. R. Isaac & James Walker & Susan Thomas, 1984. "Divergent evidence on free riding: An experimental examination of possible explanations," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 43(2), pages 113-149, January.
    13. Cornes,Richard & Sandler,Todd, 1996. "The Theory of Externalities, Public Goods, and Club Goods," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521477185, November.
    14. Thomas Riechmann, 1999. "Learning and behavioral stability An economic interpretation of genetic algorithms," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 9(2), pages 225-242.
    15. Jorgen W. Weibull, 1997. "Evolutionary Game Theory," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262731215, December.
    16. Bliss, Christopher & Nalebuff, Barry, 1984. "Dragon-slaying and ballroom dancing: The private supply of a public good," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(1-2), pages 1-12, November.
    17. Gradstein, Mark, 1992. "Time Dynamics and Incomplete Information in the Private Provision of Public Goods," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(3), pages 581-597, June.
    18. Young, H Peyton, 1993. "The Evolution of Conventions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 61(1), pages 57-84, January.
    19. Riechmann, Thomas, 2001. "Genetic algorithm learning and evolutionary games," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 25(6-7), pages 1019-1037, June.
    20. Bergstrom, Theodore & Blume, Lawrence & Varian, Hal, 1986. "On the private provision of public goods," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 25-49, February.
    21. Binmore, K. & Samuelson, L. & Gale, J., 1993. "Learning to be Imperfect: The Ultimatum Game," Working papers 9325, Wisconsin Madison - Social Systems.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Jarosław Stańczak, 2009. "Application of an evolutionary algorithm to simulation of the CO2 emission permits market with purchase prices," Operations Research and Decisions, Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, Faculty of Management, vol. 19(4), pages 93-108.
    2. Hanauske, Matthias & Kunz, Jennifer & Bernius, Steffen & König, Wolfgang, 2010. "Doves and hawks in economics revisited: An evolutionary quantum game theory based analysis of financial crises," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 389(21), pages 5084-5102.
    3. Kim Bloomquist, 2011. "Tax Compliance as an Evolutionary Coordination Game: An Agent-Based Approach," Public Finance Review, , vol. 39(1), pages 25-49, January.
    4. Ludo Waltman & Nees Eck & Rommert Dekker & Uzay Kaymak, 2011. "Economic modeling using evolutionary algorithms: the effect of a binary encoding of strategies," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 21(5), pages 737-756, December.
    5. Pedro, de Mendonça, 2009. "Self-Enforcing Climate Change Treaties: A Generalized Differential Game Approach with Applications," MPRA Paper 17889, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Jaroslaw Stanczak, 2009. "Application of an evolutionary algorithmto simulation of the co2 emission permits marketwith purchase prices," Operations Research and Decisions, Wroclaw University of Technology, Institute of Organization and Management, vol. 4, pages 94-108.
    7. repec:wut:journl:v:4:y:2009:p:94-108:id:148 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Feng, Sinan & Liu, Xuesong & Dong, Yida, 2022. "Limited punishment pool may promote cooperation in the public goods game," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 165(P2).

    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. Ledyard, John O., "undated". "Public Goods: A Survey of Experimental Research," Working Papers 861, California Institute of Technology, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences.
    2. Brunner, Eric & Sonstelie, Jon, 2003. "School finance reform and voluntary fiscal federalism," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(9-10), pages 2157-2185, September.
    3. Leslie M. Marx & Steven A. Matthews, 2000. "Dynamic Voluntary Contribution to a Public Project," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 67(2), pages 327-358.
    4. Wang, Chengsi & Zudenkova, Galina, 2016. "Non-monotonic group-size effect in repeated provision of public goods," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 116-128.
    5. Paul Pecorino, 2015. "Olson’s Logic of Collective Action at fifty," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 162(3), pages 243-262, March.
    6. Wolfgang Buchholz & Todd Sandler, 2017. "Successful Leadership in Global Public Good Provision: Incorporating Behavioural Approaches," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 67(3), pages 591-607, July.
    7. Parimal Kanti Bag & Santanu Roy, 2008. "Repeated Charitable Contributions under Incomplete Information," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(525), pages 60-91, January.
    8. Serge-Christophe Kolm, 2008. "Paradoxes of the War on Poverty: Warm-Glows and Efficiency," IDEP Working Papers 0807, Institut d'economie publique (IDEP), Marseille, France, revised 18 Nov 2008.
    9. Fraser, Clive D., 1996. "On the provision of excludable public goods," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(1), pages 111-130, April.
    10. Echazu, Luciana & Nocetti, Diego, 2015. "Charitable giving: Altruism has no limits," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 46-53.
    11. Laura Marsiliani & Thomas I. Renstroem, 2010. "Privately provided public goods in a dynamic economy," Department of Economics Working Papers 2010_02, Durham University, Department of Economics.
    12. May Elsayyad & Florian Morath, 2016. "Technology Transfers For Climate Change," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 57(3), pages 1057-1084, August.
    13. Wolfgang Buchholz & Michael Eichenseer, 2019. "Advantageous leadership in public good provision: the case of an endogenous contribution technology," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 126(1), pages 1-17, January.
    14. Romano, Richard & Yildirim, Huseyin, 2001. "Why charities announce donations: a positive perspective," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(3), pages 423-447, September.
    15. Roi Zultan & Eva-Maria Steiger, 2011. "See No Evil: Information Chains and Reciprocity in Teams," Working Papers 1108, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Department of Economics.
    16. Ferrari, Giorgio & Riedel, Frank & Steg, Jan-Henrik, 2016. "Continuous-Time Public Good Contribution under Uncertainty," Center for Mathematical Economics Working Papers 485, Center for Mathematical Economics, Bielefeld University.
    17. Wichman, Casey J., 2016. "Incentives, green preferences, and private provision of impure public goods," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 208-220.
    18. Matthew J. Kotchen, 2006. "Green Markets and Private Provision of Public Goods," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(4), pages 816-845, August.
    19. Luigi Mittone & Francesca Bortolami, 2007. "Free riding and norms of control: self determination and imposition. An experimental comparison," CEEL Working Papers 0704, Cognitive and Experimental Economics Laboratory, Department of Economics, University of Trento, Italia.
    20. Dimitrios Xefteris & Galina Zudenkova, 2018. "Electoral competition under costly policy implementation," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 50(4), pages 721-739, April.

    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:kap:compec:v:28:y:2006:i:4:p:399-420. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.