IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/joecth/v62y2016i1d10.1007_s00199-015-0864-0.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Games with strategic complements and substitutes

Author

Listed:
  • Andrew J. Monaco

    (University of Puget Sound)

  • Tarun Sabarwal

    (University of Kansas)

Abstract

This paper studies games with both strategic substitutes and strategic complements, and more generally, games with strategic heterogeneity (GSH). Such games may behave differently from either games with strategic complements or games with strategic substitutes. Under mild assumptions (on one or two players only), the equilibrium set in a GSH is totally unordered (no two equilibria are comparable in the standard product order). Moreover, under mild assumptions (on one player only), parameterized GSH do not allow decreasing equilibrium selections. In general, this cannot be strengthened to conclude increasing selections. Monotone comparative statics results are presented for games in which some players exhibit strategic substitutes and others exhibit strategic complements. For two-player games with linearly ordered strategy spaces, there is a characterization. More generally, there are sufficient conditions. The conditions apply only to players exhibiting strategic substitutes; no additional conditions are needed for players with strategic complements. Several examples highlight the results.

Suggested Citation

  • Andrew J. Monaco & Tarun Sabarwal, 2016. "Games with strategic complements and substitutes," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 62(1), pages 65-91, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:joecth:v:62:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1007_s00199-015-0864-0
    DOI: 10.1007/s00199-015-0864-0
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s00199-015-0864-0
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s00199-015-0864-0?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 look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gary S. Becker, 1974. "Crime and Punishment: An Economic Approach," NBER Chapters, in: Essays in the Economics of Crime and Punishment, pages 1-54, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. John K.-H. Quah & Bruno Strulovici, 2009. "Comparative Statics, Informativeness, and the Interval Dominance Order," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(6), pages 1949-1992, November.
    3. Rabah Amir & Val E. Lambson, 2000. "On the Effects of Entry in Cournot Markets," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 67(2), pages 235-254.
    4. Shannon, Chris, 1995. "Weak and Strong Monotone Comparative Statics," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 5(2), pages 209-227, March.
    5. Echenique, Federico, 2004. "A characterization of strategic complementarities," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 325-347, February.
    6. Edlin, Aaron S. & Shannon, Chris, 1998. "Strict Monotonicity in Comparative Statics," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 201-219, July.
    7. John K.-H Quah, 2007. "The Comparative Statics of Constrained Optimization Problems," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 75(2), pages 401-431, March.
    8. Fudenberg, Drew & Tirole, Jean, 1984. "The Fat-Cat Effect, the Puppy-Dog Ploy, and the Lean and Hungry Look," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(2), pages 361-366, May.
    9. Roy, Sunanda & Sabarwal, Tarun, 2012. "Characterizing stability properties in games with strategic substitutes," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 75(1), pages 337-353.
    10. Sunanda Roy & Tarun Sabarwal, 2008. "On the (non-)lattice structure of the equilibrium set in games with strategic substitutes," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 37(1), pages 161-169, October.
    11. Federico Echenique, 2002. "Comparative Statics by Adaptive Dynamics and the Correspondence Principle," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 70(2), pages 833-844, March.
    12. Roy, Sunanda & Sabarwal, Tarun, 2010. "Monotone comparative statics for games with strategic substitutes," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(5), pages 793-806, September.
    13. Acemoglu, Daron & Jensen, Martin Kaae, 2013. "Aggregate comparative statics," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 27-49.
    14. Milgrom, Paul & Shannon, Chris, 1994. "Monotone Comparative Statics," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 62(1), pages 157-180, January.
    15. Villas-Boas, J. Miguel, 1997. "Comparative Statics of Fixed Points," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 73(1), pages 183-198, March.
    16. Amir, Rabah & Garcia, Filomena & Knauff, Malgorzata, 2010. "Symmetry-breaking in two-player games via strategic substitutes and diagonal nonconcavity: A synthesis," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 145(5), pages 1968-1986, September.
    17. Lippman, Steven A. & Mamer, John W. & McCardle, Kevin F., 1987. "Comparative statics in non-cooperative games via transfinitely iterated play," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 288-303, April.
    18. Amir, R., 1996. "Cournot oligopoly and theory of supermodular games," LIDAM Reprints CORE 1228, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    19. Amir, Rabah, 1996. "Cournot Oligopoly and the Theory of Supermodular Games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 132-148, August.
    20. Sandeep Baliga & Tomas Sjostrom, 2012. "The Strategy of Manipulating Conflict," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(6), pages 2897-2922, October.
    21. Alexander Zimper, 2007. "A fixed point characterization of the dominance-solvability of lattice games with strategic substitutes," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 36(1), pages 107-117, September.
    22. Vives, Xavier, 1990. "Nash equilibrium with strategic complementarities," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(3), pages 305-321.
    23. Dixit, Avinash K, 1987. "Strategic Behavior in Contests," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(5), pages 891-898, December.
    24. Daron Acemoglu & Martin Kaae Jensen, 2015. "Robust Comparative Statics in Large Dynamic Economies," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 123(3), pages 587-640.
    25. Zhou Lin, 1994. "The Set of Nash Equilibria of a Supermodular Game Is a Complete Lattice," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 295-300, September.
    26. Bulow, Jeremy I & Geanakoplos, John D & Klemperer, Paul D, 1985. "Multimarket Oligopoly: Strategic Substitutes and Complements," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 93(3), pages 488-511, June.
    27. Milgrom, Paul & Roberts, John, 1994. "Comparing Equilibria," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(3), pages 441-459, June.
    28. Martin Jensen, 2010. "Aggregative games and best-reply potentials," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 43(1), pages 45-66, April.
    29. Tombak, Mihkel M., 2006. "Strategic asymmetry," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 61(3), pages 339-350, November.
    30. Shadmehr, Mehdi & Bernhardt, Dan, 2011. "Collective Action with Uncertain Payoffs: Coordination, Public Signals, and Punishment Dilemmas," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 105(4), pages 829-851, November.
    31. Nirvikar Singh & Xavier Vives, 1984. "Price and Quantity Competition in a Differentiated Duopoly," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 15(4), pages 546-554, Winter.
    32. Milgrom, Paul & Roberts, John, 1990. "Rationalizability, Learning, and Equilibrium in Games with Strategic Complementarities," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 58(6), pages 1255-1277, November.
    33. Donald M. Topkis, 1978. "Minimizing a Submodular Function on a Lattice," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 26(2), pages 305-321, April.
    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. Roy, Sunanda & Sabarwal, Tarun, 2012. "Characterizing stability properties in games with strategic substitutes," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 75(1), pages 337-353.
    2. Andrew Monaco & Tarun Sabarwal, 2012. "Monotone Comparative Statics in Games with both Strategic Complements and Strategic Substitutes," WORKING PAPERS SERIES IN THEORETICAL AND APPLIED ECONOMICS 201236, University of Kansas, Department of Economics, revised Aug 2012.
    3. Andrew Monaco & Tarun Sabarwal, 2012. "Games with Strategic Heterogeneity," WORKING PAPERS SERIES IN THEORETICAL AND APPLIED ECONOMICS 201240, University of Kansas, Department of Economics, revised Nov 2012.
    4. Anne-Christine Barthel & Tarun Sabarwal, 2018. "Directional monotone comparative statics," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 66(3), pages 557-591, October.
    5. Roy, Sunanda & Sabarwal, Tarun, 2010. "Monotone comparative statics for games with strategic substitutes," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(5), pages 793-806, September.
    6. Shuoxun Zhang & Tarun Sabarwal & Li Gan, 2015. "Strategic Or Nonstrategic: The Role Of Financial Benefit In Bankruptcy," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(2), pages 1004-1018, April.
    7. repec:kan:wpaper:201412 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Amir, Rabah & De Castro, Luciano, 2017. "Nash equilibrium in games with quasi-monotonic best-responses," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 172(C), pages 220-246.
    9. repec:kan:wpaper:201502 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Uttiya Paul & Tarun Sabarwal, 2023. "Directional monotone comparative statics in function spaces," Economic Theory Bulletin, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 11(1), pages 153-169, April.
    11. Acemoglu, Daron & Jensen, Martin Kaae, 2013. "Aggregate comparative statics," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 27-49.
    12. Echenique, Federico, 2004. "A characterization of strategic complementarities," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 325-347, February.
    13. Rabah Amir, 2018. "Special issue: supermodularity and monotone methods in economics," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 66(3), pages 547-556, October.
    14. Charlene Cosandier & Filomena Garcia & Malgorzata Knauff, 2018. "Price competition with differentiated goods and incomplete product awareness," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 66(3), pages 681-705, October.
    15. Christian Ewerhart, 2020. "Ordinal potentials in smooth games," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 70(4), pages 1069-1100, November.
    16. Finn Christensen, 2019. "Comparative statics and heterogeneity," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 67(3), pages 665-702, April.
    17. Rabah Amir, 2005. "Supermodularity and Complementarity in Economics: An Elementary Survey," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 71(3), pages 636-660, January.
    18. Sunanda Roy & Tarun Sabarwal, 2008. "On the (non-)lattice structure of the equilibrium set in games with strategic substitutes," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 37(1), pages 161-169, October.
    19. Amir, Rabah, 2005. "Ordinal versus cardinal complementarity: The case of Cournot oligopoly," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 1-14, October.
    20. Sunanda Roy & Tarun Sabarwal, 2005. "Comparative Statics with Never Increasing Correspondences," Game Theory and Information 0505001, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 21 Oct 2005.
    21. Amir, Rabah & Bloch, Francis, 2009. "Comparative statics in a simple class of strategic market games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 65(1), pages 7-24, January.
    22. Anne-Christine Barthel & Eric Hoffmann, 2020. "Characterizing monotone games," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 70(4), pages 1045-1068, November.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Lattice games; Strategic complements; Strategic substitutes; Strategic heterogeneity; Equilibrium set; Monotone comparative statics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C70 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - General
    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:spr:joecth:v:62:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1007_s00199-015-0864-0. 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.