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Social Stability and Catastrophe Risk: Lessons From the Stag Hunt

Author

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  • Michael R. Powers

    (Temple University's Fox School of Business, Tsinghua Universitys School of Economics and Management, michael.powers@temple.edu)

  • Zhan Shen

    (Shenzhen Ping An Bank, shenzhan001@pingan.com.cn, samson.shen@gmail.com)

Abstract

Had the destruction and suffering visited upon New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina been the result of a terrorist attack, it would have been very successful — not because of the number of innocent lives lost or amount of property destroyed, but rather because of the breakdown of the social order. What better possible outcome could a terrorist envision than planting seeds of doubt regarding the willingness and ability of individuals and government to fulfill their respective roles in the `social contract'? In this article, we employ a class of symmetric, ordinal 2 × 2 games — including the frequently studied Prisoner's Dilemma, Chicken, and Stag Hunt — to model the stability of the social contract in the face of catastrophic changes in social relations. In two alternative analyses, we find that the Stag Hunt provides a relatively stable and efficient normative model for society. These results offer useful insights into the pre- and post-event management of catastrophe risks, especially large-scale terrorist attacks designed to disrupt the social order.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael R. Powers & Zhan Shen, 2008. "Social Stability and Catastrophe Risk: Lessons From the Stag Hunt," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 20(4), pages 477-497, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jothpo:v:20:y:2008:i:4:p:477-497
    DOI: 10.1177/0951629808093777
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Vanderschraaf, Peter, 1998. "The Informal Game Theory in Hume's Account of Convention," Economics and Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(2), pages 215-247, October.
    2. repec:cup:cbooks:9780521555838 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Ken Binmore, 1998. "Game Theory and the Social Contract - Vol. 2: Just Playing," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 2, number 0262024446, April.
    4. Ken Binmore, 1994. "Game Theory and the Social Contract, Volume 1: Playing Fair," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262023636, April.
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    Cited by:

    1. Khemraj, Tarron, 2019. "Two ethnic security dilemmas and their economic origin," MPRA Paper 101263, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Michael R. Powers, 2009. "Constant-sum sampling: an apology for statistics' “original sin”," Journal of Risk Finance, Emerald Group Publishing, vol. 10(4), pages 317-320, August.

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