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The Survival of the Conformist: Social Pressure and Renewable Resource Management

Author

Listed:
  • Alessandro Tavoni

    (Advanced School of Economics at the University of Venice)

  • Maja Schlüter

    (Leibniz-Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries)

  • Simon Levin

    (Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Princeton University)

Abstract

This paper examines the role of pro-social behavior as a mechanism for the establishment and maintenance of cooperation in resource use under variable social and environmental conditions. By coupling resource stock dynamics with social dynamics concerning compliance to a social norm prescribing non-excessive resource extraction in a common pool resource (CPR), we show that when reputational considerations matter and a sufficient level of social stigma affects the violators of a norm, sustainable outcomes are achieved. We find large parameter regions where norm-observing and norm-violating types coexist, and analyze to what extent such coexistence depends on the environment.

Suggested Citation

  • Alessandro Tavoni & Maja Schlüter & Simon Levin, 2010. "The Survival of the Conformist: Social Pressure and Renewable Resource Management," Working Papers 2010.127, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    • Handle: RePEc:fem:femwpa:2010.127
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    Cited by:

    1. Sergio Currarini & Carmen Marchiori & Alessandro Tavoni, 2016. "Network Economics and the Environment: Insights and Perspectives," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 65(1), pages 159-189, September.
    2. Alessandro Tavoni & Simon Levin, 2014. "Managing the climate commons at the nexus of ecology, behaviour and economics," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 4(12), pages 1057-1063, December.
    3. Maja Schl�ter & Alessandro Tavoni & Simon Levin, 2014. "Robustness of norm-driven cooperation in the commons to environmental variability," GRI Working Papers 146, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
    4. Richter, Andries & Grasman, Johan, 2013. "The transmission of sustainable harvesting norms when agents are conditionally cooperative," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 202-209.
    5. Dongryul Lee & Pilwon Kim, 2018. "Isolation and exploitation of minority: Game theoretical analysis," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(10), pages 1-7, October.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Cooperation; Social Norm; Ostracism; Common Pool Resource; Evolutionary Game Theory; Replicator Equation; Agent-based Simulation; Coupled Socio-resource Dynamics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C73 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Stochastic and Dynamic Games; Evolutionary Games
    • Q20 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - General
    • D70 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - General

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