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Public Goods Provision and Sanctioning in Privileged Groups

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  • Ernesto Reuben
  • Arno Riedl

Abstract

In public good provision, privileged groups enjoy the advantage that some of its members find it optimal to supply a positive amount of the public good. However, their inherent asymmetric nature may make the enforcement of cooperative behavior through informal sanctioning harder to accomplish. In this paper we experimentally investigate public good provision in normal and privileged groups with and without decentralized punishment. We find that compared to normal groups, privileged groups are relatively ineffective in using costly sanctions to increase everyone's contributions. Punishment is less targeted towards strong free-riders and they exhibit a weaker increase in contributions after being punished. Thus, we show that privileged groups are not as privileged as they initially seem.

Suggested Citation

  • Ernesto Reuben & Arno Riedl, 2007. "Public Goods Provision and Sanctioning in Privileged Groups," CESifo Working Paper Series 2063, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_2063
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    privileged groups; public goods; punishment; cooperation; collective action;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C92 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Group Behavior
    • D01 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Microeconomic Behavior: Underlying Principles
    • H41 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Public Goods
    • Z13 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification

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