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The Limits of Self-Governance in the Presence of Spite: Experimental Evidence from Urban and Rural Russia

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Author Info
Simon Gaechter
Benedikt Herrmann

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Abstract

We report evidence from public goods experiments with and without punishment which we conducted in Russia with 566 urban and rural participants of young and mature age cohorts. Russia is interesting for studying voluntary cooperation because of its long history of collectivism, and a huge urban-rural gap. In contrast to previous experiments we find no cooperation-enhancing effect of punishment. An important reason is that there is substantial spiteful punishment of high contributors in all four subject pools. Thus, spite undermines the scope for self-governance in the sense of high levels of voluntary cooperation that are sustained by sanctioning free riders only.

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Paper provided by The Field Experiments Website in its series Artefactual Field Experiments with number 0042.

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Length: 33 pages
Date of creation: 2006
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Handle: RePEc:feb:artefa:0042

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Related research
Keywords: social norms; free riding; punishment; spite; experiments;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
H41 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Public Goods
C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
D23 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Organizational Behavior; Transaction Costs; Property Rights
C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games

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Full references

Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Ernesto Reuben & Arno Riedl, 2007. "Public Goods Provision and Sanctioning in Privileged Groups," CESifo Working Paper Series CESifo Working Paper No. , CESifo Group Munich. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  2. Jeffrey Carpenter & Peter Matthews, 2009. "What norms trigger punishment?," Experimental Economics, Springer, vol. 12(3), pages 272-288, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  3. Armin Falk & Christian Zehnder, 2007. "Discrimination and In-Group Favoritism in a Citywide Trust Experiment," IZA Discussion Papers 2765, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  4. Martin G. Kocher & Peter Martinsson & Martine Visser, 2006. "Does Stake Size matter for Cooperation and Punishment?," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 06-104/1, Tinbergen Institute. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  5. Ye, Maoliang & Nikolov, Plamen & Casaburi, Lorenzo & Asher, Sam, 2008. "One Step at a Time: Do threshold patterns matter in public good provision?," MPRA Paper 12029, University Library of Munich, Germany. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  6. Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2006. "Homo Reciprocans: Survey Evidence on Prevalence, Behavior and Success," IZA Discussion Papers 2205, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  7. Visser, Martine & Burns, Justine, 2006. "Bridging the Great Divide in South Africa: Inequality and Punishment in the Provision of Public Goods," Working Papers in Economics 219, Göteborg University, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
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