IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ico/wpaper/62.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Trust and Social Control. Sources of cooperation, performance, and stability in informal value transfer systems

Author

Listed:
  • Claudius Graebner

    (Institute for Institutional and Innovation Economics (iino), University of Bremen, Germany)

  • Wolfram Elsner

    (Institute for Institutional and Innovation Economics, University of Bremen, Germany)

  • Alexander Lascaux

    (Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, Moscow, Russia)

Abstract

We study the functioning of informal value transfer systems (IVTS) with the example of Hawala. More precisely, we use computational experiments to study the roles of generalized trust and social control for the stability and efficiency of IVTS. Previous literature was ambiguous with regard to: (i) how trust and control should be operationalized formally, (ii) which, if any of the two, carries a larger relevance for the functioning of IVTS, (iii) whether (and when) they relate to each other as substitutes or complements, and (iv) how they interact with a number of other environmental conditions. Our experiments suggest answers to all these questions. We show that both trust and control are necessary, but not sufficient to guarantee the functioning of Hawala, and that other relevant conditions, such as population size, interaction density, and forgiveness of the agents, provide important contexts. Aside from clarifying these questions, we provide a theoretically grounded operationalization of generalized trust and social control that is applicable to informal exchange systems in general.

Suggested Citation

  • Claudius Graebner & Wolfram Elsner & Alexander Lascaux, 2017. "Trust and Social Control. Sources of cooperation, performance, and stability in informal value transfer systems," ICAE Working Papers 62, Johannes Kepler University, Institute for Comprehensive Analysis of the Economy.
    • Handle: RePEc:ico:wpaper:62
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.jku.at/fileadmin/gruppen/108/ICAE_Working_Papers/wp62.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2017
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hauk, Esther, 2001. "Leaving the Prison: Permitting Partner Choice and Refusal in Prisoner's Dilemma Games," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 18(1), pages 65-87, August.
    2. Stanley, E. Ann & Ashlock, Dan & Tesfatsion, Leigh, 1993. "Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma with Choice and Refusal of Partners," ISU General Staff Papers 199302010800001028, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    3. Dulce Redín & Reyes Calderón & Ignacio Ferrero, 2014. "Exploring the Ethical Dimension of Hawala," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 124(2), pages 327-337, October.
    4. Anderson, Siwan & Baland, Jean-Marie & Moene, Karl Ove, 2009. "Enforcement in informal saving groups," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(1), pages 14-23, September.
    5. Friedrich Schneider, 2008. "Money laundering and financial means of organised crime: some preliminary empirical findings," Global Business and Economics Review, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 10(3), pages 309-330.
    6. Catrinescu, Natalia & Leon-Ledesma, Miguel & Piracha, Matloob & Quillin, Bryce, 2009. "Remittances, Institutions, and Economic Growth," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 81-92, January.
    7. Henk van de Bunt, 2008. "A case study on the misuse ofhawalabanking," International Journal of Social Economics, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 35(9), pages 691-702, August.
    8. Alexander Lascaux, 2015. "Crowding Out Trust in the Informal Monetary Relationships: The Curious Case of the Hawala System," Forum for Social Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(1), pages 87-107, April.
    9. Friedrich Schneider, 2010. "Turnover of organized crime and money laundering: some preliminary empirical findings," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 144(3), pages 473-486, September.
    10. Thanh Le, 2009. "Trade, Remittances, Institutions, and Economic Growth," International Economic Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(3), pages 391-408.
    11. Schramm, Matthias & Taube, Markus, 2003. "Evolution and institutional foundation of the hawala financial system," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 12(4), pages 405-420.
    12. Claudius Graebner, 2018. "How to Relate Models to Reality? An Epistemological Framework for the Validation and Verification of Computational Models," Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation, Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation, vol. 21(3), pages 1-8.
    13. Elsner, Wolfram & Schwardt, Henning, 2014. "Trust and arena size: expectations, institutions, and general trust, and critical population and group sizes," Journal of Institutional Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 10(1), pages 107-134, March.
    14. Timothy Besley, 1995. "Nonmarket Institutions for Credit and Risk Sharing in Low-Income Countries," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 115-127, Summer.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Alexander Lascaux, 2015. "Crowding Out Trust in the Informal Monetary Relationships: The Curious Case of the Hawala System," Forum for Social Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(1), pages 87-107, April.
    2. Ma, Yechi & Chen, Zhiguo & Shinwari, Riazullah & Khan, Zeeshan, 2021. "Financialization, globalization, and Dutch disease: Is Dutch disease exist for resources rich countries?," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    3. Escriba-Folch, Abel & Meseguer, Covadonga & Wright, Joseph, 2018. "Remittances and protest in dictatorships," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 89058, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    4. Biru Paul & Md. Uddin & Abdullah Noman, 2011. "Remittances and output in Bangladesh: an ARDL bounds testing approach to cointegration," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 58(2), pages 229-242, June.
    5. Balli, Faruk & Guven, Cahit & Balli, Hatice O. & Gounder, Rukmani, 2010. "The Role of Institutions, Culture, and Wellbeing in Explaining Bilateral Remittance Flows: Evidence Both Cross-Country and Individual-Level Analysis," MPRA Paper 29609, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Hao, Linna & Ahmad, Shabbir & Chang, Hsu-Ling & Umar, Muhammad, 2021. "Knowledge spill-over and institutional quality role in controlling Dutch disease: A case of BRICS countries," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    7. Jozef Pacolet & Joris Vanormelingen, 2015. "Illicit Financial Flows: concepts and first macro estimates for Belgium and its 18 preferred partner countries," BeFinD Working Papers 0110, University of Namur, Department of Economics.
    8. Adams, Samuel & Klobodu, Edem Kwame Mensah, 2016. "Remittances, regime durability and economic growth in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 1-8.
    9. Sunny Kumar Singh, 2019. "Revisiting Institutional Determinants of Remittances: Evidence from a Large Panel of Countries," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 39(4), pages 2247-2257.
    10. El Hamma Imad, 2017. "Do political institutions improve the effect of remittances on economic growth? Evidence South-Mediterranean countries," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 37(3), pages 2133-2148.
    11. Michele Manna, 2022. "The bonfire of banknotes," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 25, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    12. Oluwasheyi S. Oladipo, 2020. "Migrant Workers' Remittances And Economic Growth: A Time Series Analysis," Journal of Developing Areas, Tennessee State University, College of Business, vol. 54(4), pages 75-88, October-D.
    13. Sena Kimm Gnangnon, 2019. "Remittances Inflows and Trade Policy," Remittances Review, Remittances Review, vol. 4(2), pages 117-142, October.
    14. Ekpeno L. Effiong & Emmanuel E. Asuquo, 2017. "Migrants' Remittances, Governance and Heterogeneity," International Economic Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 31(4), pages 535-554, October.
    15. Blaise Gnimassoun & John C. Anyanwu, 2019. "The Diaspora and economic development in Africa," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 155(4), pages 785-817, November.
    16. Chrysost Bangake & Jude Eggoh, 2020. "Financial Development Thresholds and the Remittances-Growth Nexus," Journal of Quantitative Economics, Springer;The Indian Econometric Society (TIES), vol. 18(2), pages 425-445, June.
    17. Edwin Le Heron & Nicolas Yol, 2019. "The macroeconomic effects of migrants' remittances in Moldova: a stock–flow consistent model," European Journal of Economics and Economic Policies: Intervention, Edward Elgar Publishing, vol. 16(1), pages 31-54, April.
    18. Eunice Adu-Darko & Emmanuel K Aidoo, 2022. "Government Stability in the Remittance-Economic Growth Link in Ghana," International Journal of Applied Economics, Finance and Accounting, Online Academic Press, vol. 14(1), pages 1-14.
    19. Cazachevici, Alina & Havranek, Tomas & Horvath, Roman, 2020. "Remittances and economic growth: A meta-analysis," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    20. Dorsaf Sridi & Imene Guetat, 2020. "The direct and indirect risk impacts on remittances: A cross‐regional specific effects," African Development Review, African Development Bank, vol. 32(3), pages 288-302, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Hawala; Computational experiment; Informal Value Transfer Systems; Institution; Social Control; Trust;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C63 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Mathematical Methods; Programming Models; Mathematical and Simulation Modeling - - - Computational Techniques
    • C7 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness
    • G29 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Other
    • O17 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Formal and Informal Sectors; Shadow Economy; Institutional Arrangements

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ico:wpaper:62. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Teresa Griesebner The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask Teresa Griesebner to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/igjkuat.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.