The Competitive Advantage of Sanctioning Institutions

Gürerk, Özgür; Irlenbusch, Bernd; Rockenbach, Bettina

doi:10.1126/science.1123633

Cited by 831 publications

(565 citation statements)

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“…In line with this perspective, earlier experimental studies find that under perfect information a majority of the subjects end up in the punishment institution when given the choice between decentralized punishment and no punishment (Gürerk et al, 2006). Subjects' willingness to punish free-riders creates a credible threat and coordinates behavior on high contributions, and only little actual punishment is required to enforce this outcome.…”

Section: Behavioral Predictionsmentioning

confidence: 57%

“…We combine a voting by feet mechanism between different sanctioning regimes (Gürerk et al, 2006) with imperfect information about individual contributions (Grechenig et al, 2010). There are ten citizens and one authority.…”

Section: The Gamementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Furthermore, like in a feudal society the authority is not appointed by a competitive procedure, but he is merely born into his position. 6 Following previous works showing that decentralized sanctions prevail over a sanction-free environment (Gürerk, Irlenbusch, & Rockenbach, 2006) and over a pure reputation-building environment (Rockenbach & Milinski, 2006), we let our players choose their institution by leaving societies (exit), but not by vote (voice). 7 Consequently, each citizen is free to migrate to his most preferred institution.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Information-sensitive Leviathans

Nicklisch

Grechenig

Thöni

2016

Journal of Public Economics

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Abstract We study information conditions under which individuals are willing to delegate their sanctioning power to a central authority. We design a public goods game in which players can move between institutional environments, and we vary the observability of others' contributions. We find that the relative popularity of centralized sanctioning crucially depends on the interaction between the observability of the cooperation of others and the absence of punishment targeted at cooperative individuals. While central institutions do not outperform decentralized sanctions under perfect information, large parts of the population are attracted by central institutions that rarely punish cooperative individuals in environments with limited observability. Terms of use: Documents in

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Section: Behavioral Predictionsmentioning

confidence: 57%

Section: The Gamementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Information-sensitive Leviathans

Nicklisch

Grechenig

Thöni

2016

Journal of Public Economics

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“…In a particularly elegant set of experiments, it has been shown that, if players of a Public Good game are offered before each round the choice between the versions with or without Punishment, many tend first to shun negative incentives. They need a few rounds to learn to switch to the version with sanctions [66]. Together with the theoretical model of a Public Good game with Punishment, based on voluntary participation [46], this provides a neat application of Hardin's principle 'Mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon' [23].…”

Section: The Limitations Of Peer-punishmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Punish or perish? Retaliation and collaboration among humans

Sigmund

2007

Trends in Ecology & Evolution

271

238

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“…In some situations, 57 individual players directly punish defectors (peer punishment;Fowler, 2005; Bochet et al, 58 2006;Cinyabuguma et al, 2006;Gürerk et al, 2006;Ertan et al, 2009). 59…”

Section: Introduction 41mentioning

confidence: 99%

Games of corruption: How to suppress illegal logging

Lee

Sigmund

Dieckmann

et al. 2015

Journal of Theoretical Biology

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(269 words) 17Corruption is one of the most serious obstacles for ecosystem management and biodiversity 18 conservation. In particular, more than half of the loss of forested area in many tropical 19 countries is due to illegal logging, with corruption implicated in a lack of enforcement. Here 20 we study an evolutionary game model to analyze the illegal harvesting of forest trees, coupled 21 with the corruption of rule enforcers. We consider several types of harvesters, who may or 22 may not be committed towards supporting an enforcer service, and who may cooperate (log 23 legally) or defect (log illegally). We also consider two types of rule enforcers, honest and 24 corrupt: while honest enforcers fulfill their function, corrupt enforcers accept bribes from 25 defecting harvesters and refrain from fining them. We report three key findings. First, in the 26 absence of strategy exploration, the harvester-enforcer dynamics are bistable: one continuum 27 of equilibria consists of defecting harvesters and a low fraction of honest enforcers, while 28 another consists of cooperating harvesters and a high fraction of honest enforcers. Both 29 continua attract nearby strategy mixtures. Second, even a small rate of strategy exploration 30 removes this bistability, rendering one of the outcomes globally stable. It is the relative rate of 31 exploration among enforcers that then determines whether most harvesters cooperate or defect 32 and most enforcers are honest or corrupt, respectively. This suggests that the education of 33 enforcers, causing their more frequent trialing of honest conduct, can be a potent means of 34 curbing corruption. Third, if information on corrupt enforcers is available, and players react 35 opportunistically to it, the domain of attraction of cooperative outcomes widens considerably. 36We conclude by discussing policy implications of our results. 37Keywords: line segments of equilibria, bistability, exploration-induced-equilibrium, 38 information 39 40Page 3 of 45 Introduction 41Although the "tragedy of the commons" is ubiquitous (Hardin, 1968), field research on 42 governing the commons, as well as laboratory experiments on public good games, show that, 43 sometimes, cooperation can be maintained and the tragedy avoided (e.g., Ostrom, 1990; 44 Henrich, 2006;Henrich et al., 2006; Rutagi et al., 2010). In particular, research by Elinor 45Ostrom and colleagues has shown that people are frequently able to discuss, establish, and 46 enforce rules defining a system of punishment for rule breakers (Ostrom, 2000). In her view, 47 institutions are tools for providing incentives to promote cooperation (Ostrom and Walker, 48 1997; Ostrom et al., 2004). Ostrom's basic design principles for social settings that allow 49 long-lasting resource use include the successful establishment of a monitoring and 50 sanctioning system (Ostrom, 1990). Such systems provide examples of mechanisms that 51 enforce cooperation by punishing defectors. 52The general theory of sanctioning mechanisms has been stu...

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The Competitive Advantage of Sanctioning Institutions

Cited by 831 publications

References 29 publications

Information-sensitive Leviathans

Information-sensitive Leviathans

Punish or perish? Retaliation and collaboration among humans

Games of corruption: How to suppress illegal logging

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