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Reputation helps solve the ‘tragedy of the commons’

Author

Listed:
  • Manfred Milinski

    (Max Planck Institute of Limnology)

  • Dirk Semmann

    (Max Planck Institute of Limnology)

  • Hans-Jürgen Krambeck

    (Max Planck Institute of Limnology)

Abstract

The problem of sustaining a public resource that everybody is free to overuse—the ‘tragedy of the commons’1,2,3,4,5,6,7—emerges in many social dilemmas, such as our inability to sustain the global climate. Public goods experiments4, which are used to study this type of problem, usually confirm that the collective benefit will not be produced. Because individuals and countries often participate in several social games simultaneously, the interaction of these games may provide a sophisticated way by which to maintain the public resource. Indirect reciprocity8, ‘give and you shall receive’, is built on reputation and can sustain a high level of cooperation, as shown by game theorists9,10,11. Here we show, through alternating rounds of public goods and indirect reciprocity games, that the need to maintain reputation for indirect reciprocity maintains contributions to the public good at an unexpectedly high level. But if rounds of indirect reciprocation are not expected, then contributions to the public good drop quickly to zero. Alternating the games leads to higher profits for all players. As reputation may be a currency that is valid in many social games, our approach could be used to test social dilemmas for their solubility.

Suggested Citation

  • Manfred Milinski & Dirk Semmann & Hans-Jürgen Krambeck, 2002. "Reputation helps solve the ‘tragedy of the commons’," Nature, Nature, vol. 415(6870), pages 424-426, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:415:y:2002:i:6870:d:10.1038_415424a
    DOI: 10.1038/415424a
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Zha, Jiajing & Li, Cong & Fan, Suohai, 2022. "The effect of stability-based strategy updating on cooperation in evolutionary social dilemmas," Applied Mathematics and Computation, Elsevier, vol. 413(C).
    2. Giangiacomo Bravo, 2011. "Agents’ beliefs and the evolution of institutions for common-pool resource management," Rationality and Society, , vol. 23(1), pages 117-152, February.
    3. Laura Schmid & Farbod Ekbatani & Christian Hilbe & Krishnendu Chatterjee, 2023. "Quantitative assessment can stabilize indirect reciprocity under imperfect information," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-14, December.
    4. Andrea Guazzini & Mirko Duradoni & Alessandro Lazzeri & Giorgio Gronchi, 2018. "Simulating the Cost of Cooperation: A Recipe for Collaborative Problem-Solving," Future Internet, MDPI, vol. 10(6), pages 1-17, June.
    5. Tamas David-Barrett, 2022. "Clustering Drives Cooperation on Reputation Networks, All Else Fixed," Papers 2203.00372, arXiv.org.
    6. Claudius Gros, 2022. "Collective strategy condensation towards class-separated societies," Papers 2206.03421, arXiv.org.
    7. Ding, Rui & Wang, Xianjia & Liu, Yang & Zhao, Jinhua & Gu, Cuiling, 2023. "Evolutionary games with environmental feedbacks under an external incentive mechanism," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    8. Jo, Ara & Carattini, Stefano, 2021. "Trust and CO2 emissions: Cooperation on a global scale," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 190(C), pages 922-937.
    9. Tatsuya Sasaki & Satoshi Uchida & Isamu Okada & Hitoshi Yamamoto, 2024. "The Evolution of Cooperation and Diversity under Integrated Indirect Reciprocity," Games, MDPI, vol. 15(2), pages 1-16, April.
    10. Marco Vincenzi, 2023. "Mapping the empirical relationship between environmental performance and social preferences: Evidence from macro data," ECONOMICS AND POLICY OF ENERGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2023(1), pages 85-102.
    11. Claudius Gros, 2022. "Generic catastrophic poverty when selfish investors exploit a degradable common resource," Papers 2208.08171, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2023.
    12. Bin Guo & Lei Yuan & Mengyuan Lu, 2023. "Analysis of Influencing Factors of Farmers’ Homestead Revitalization Intention from the Perspective of Social Capital," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(4), pages 1-18, April.
    13. Ma, Xiaojian & Quan, Ji & Wang, Xianjia, 2021. "Effect of reputation-based heterogeneous investment on cooperation in spatial public goods game," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 152(C).
    14. Giangiacomo Bravo & Lucia Tamburino, 2008. "The Evolution of Trust in Non-Simultaneous Exchange Situations," Rationality and Society, , vol. 20(1), pages 85-113, February.
    15. Qinghu Liao & Wenwen Dong & Boxin Zhao, 2023. "A New Strategy to Solve “the Tragedy of the Commons” in Sustainable Grassland Ecological Compensation: Experience from Inner Mongolia, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-24, June.
    16. Ma, Yin-Jie & Jiang, Zhi-Qiang & Podobnik, Boris, 2022. "Predictability of players’ actions as a mechanism to boost cooperation," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 164(C).
    17. Mirko Duradoni & Mario Paolucci & Franco Bagnoli & Andrea Guazzini, 2018. "Fairness and Trust in Virtual Environments: The Effects of Reputation," Future Internet, MDPI, vol. 10(6), pages 1-15, June.
    18. Saptarshi Pal & Christian Hilbe, 2022. "Reputation effects drive the joint evolution of cooperation and social rewarding," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-11, December.
    19. Luhe Yang & Duoxing Yang & Lianzhong Zhang, 2022. "The Effect of Bounded Rationality on Human Cooperation with Voluntary Participation," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 10(9), pages 1-12, May.

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