IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/liu/liuced/91.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Incomplete contracts and corporate ethics: a game theoretical model under fuzzy information

Author

Abstract

Corporations allocate to they corporate governance structures authority over a large part of the transactions they carry out, both regulated by (incomplete) labour contracts or by (incomplete) arm's length contract. These contracts, as the eventuality of unforeseen contingencies is anticipated, are completed by residual rights of control allocating discretion upon ex ante non-contractible decisions to one party in the contract. Ownership and control structures respond to a need of minimising some transaction costs, but also admit the risk of abuse of authority. Both empirical investigation and theoretical deduction from the theory of firm suggest that corporations need systems of self-regulatory norms of behaviour like codes of ethics exactly because of the 'abuse of authority' problem. One requirement that a code of ethics must satisfy is to answer the question how who holds authority in the firm may undertake commitments over events and situations that cannot be ex ante contractible nor describable. This paper suggests a first modelling of unforeseen contingencies in terms of fuzzy sets theory. Incomplete knowledge about unforeseen contingencies is captured by defining some events as fuzzy sub-sets of the set of unforeseen states of the world. Such events correspond to terms of the ex ante language used to define the domain of general abstract principles. The cost of their all-encompassing nature is vagueness. This opens the route to define domains of abstract principles as fuzzy sets of unforeseen states of the world. Then a model is suggested of the reasoning the players perform, given this incomplete (vague) base of knowledge, in order to jump from vague premises to what it has to be done in any unforeseen contingency. Players' inferences are understood according to the logic of default reasoning. The intuition is that, given our limited knowledge, we extend our belief that the "normal course" does in fact hold also to the unforeseen situations. As a consequence are defined commitments that a player conforming to the code is expected to carry out. This allows replicating within the new context some well-known results in the theory of reputation games.

Suggested Citation

  • Lorenzo Sacconi, 2001. "Incomplete contracts and corporate ethics: a game theoretical model under fuzzy information," LIUC Papers in Ethics, Law and Economics 91, Cattaneo University (LIUC).
    • Handle: RePEc:liu:liuced:91
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://biblio.liuc.it/liucpap/pdf/91.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lorenzo Sacconi & Stefano Moretti, 2002. "Fuzzy norms, default reasoning and equilibrium selection in games under unforeseen contingencies and incomplete knowledge," LIUC Papers in Ethics, Law and Economics 104, Cattaneo University (LIUC).
    2. Hart, Oliver & Moore, John, 1990. "Property Rights and the Nature of the Firm," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(6), pages 1119-1158, December.
    3. Oliver Hart & John Moore, 1999. "Foundations of Incomplete Contracts," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 66(1), pages 115-138.
    4. Drew Fudenberg & David K. Levine, 2008. "Reputation And Equilibrium Selection In Games With A Patient Player," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Drew Fudenberg & David K Levine (ed.), A Long-Run Collaboration On Long-Run Games, chapter 7, pages 123-142, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    5. Grossman, Sanford J & Hart, Oliver D, 1986. "The Costs and Benefits of Ownership: A Theory of Vertical and Lateral Integration," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(4), pages 691-719, August.
    6. Nash, John, 1950. "The Bargaining Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 18(2), pages 155-162, April.
    7. Drew Fudenberg & David K. Levine, 2008. "Maintaining a Reputation when Strategies are Imperfectly Observed," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Drew Fudenberg & David K Levine (ed.), A Long-Run Collaboration On Long-Run Games, chapter 8, pages 143-161, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    8. Luca Anderlini & Leonardo Felli, 1999. "Incomplete Contracts and Complexity Costs," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 46(1), pages 23-50, February.
    9. Anderlini, Luca & Felli, Leonardo, 2004. "Bounded rationality and incomplete contracts," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(1), pages 3-30, March.
    10. Jean Tirole, 1999. "Incomplete Contracts: Where Do We Stand?," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 67(4), pages 741-782, July.
    11. Drew Fudenberg & Jean Tirole, 1991. "Game Theory," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262061414, December.
    12. Yusuf M. Mansur, 1995. "Fuzzy Sets And Economics," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 299.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gianluca Grimalda & Lorenzo Sacconi, 2005. "The Constitution of the Not-For-Profit Organisation: Reciprocal Conformity to Morality," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 16(3), pages 249-276, September.
    2. Markus Beckmann & Ingo Pies, 2007. "Freiheit durch Bindung — Zur ökonomischen Logik von Verhaltenskodizes," Schmalenbach Journal of Business Research, Springer, vol. 59(5), pages 615-645, August.
    3. Gianluca Grimalda & Lorenzo Sacconi, 2002. "The Constitution of the Nonprofit Enterprise: Ideals, Conformism and Reciprocity," LIUC Papers in Ethics, Law and Economics 115, Cattaneo University (LIUC).
    4. Lorenzo Sacconi, 2007. "A Social Contract Account for CSR as an Extended Model of Corporate Governance (II): Compliance, Reputation and Reciprocity," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 75(1), pages 77-96, September.

    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. Anderlini, Luca & Felli, Leonardo, 2004. "Bounded rationality and incomplete contracts," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(1), pages 3-30, March.
    2. Schmitz, Patrick W., 2010. "Contractual solutions to hold-up problems with quality uncertainty and unobservable investments," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(5), pages 807-816, September.
    3. Lorenzo Sacconi, 2011. "A Rawlsian View of CSR and the Game Theory of its Implementation (Part I): the Multi-stakeholder Model of Corporate Governance," International Economic Association Series, in: Lorenzo Sacconi & Margaret Blair & R. Edward Freeman & Alessandro Vercelli (ed.), Corporate Social Responsibility and Corporate Governance, chapter 7, pages 157-193, Palgrave Macmillan.
    4. Patrick W. Schmitz, 2006. "Information Gathering, Transaction Costs, and the Property Rights Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 422-434, March.
    5. Rosenkranz, Stephanie & Schmitz, Patrick W., 2003. "Optimal allocation of ownership rights in dynamic R&D alliances," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 153-173, April.
    6. Bickenbach, Frank, 2000. "Regulation of Europe's network industries: the perspective of the new economic theory of federalism," Kiel Working Papers 977, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    7. Lars Kumkar, 2003. "Regulatory Choices and Commitment: Challenges for Electricity Market Regulation in Kosovo," Post-Communist Economies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(1), pages 91-115.
    8. Schmitz, Patrick W., 2013. "Incomplete contracts and optimal ownership of public goods," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 118(1), pages 94-96.
    9. Patrick W. Schmitz, 2001. "Partial Privatization and Incomplete Contracts: The Proper Scope of Government Reconsidered," FinanzArchiv: Public Finance Analysis, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 57(4), pages 394-411, August.
    10. Gersbach, Hans & Haller, Hans, 2020. "On efficient firm formation," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 1-12.
    11. Schmitz, Patrick W., 2023. "The proper scope of government reconsidered: Asymmetric information and incentive contracts," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    12. Oriol Carbonell-Nicolau & Diego Comin, 2005. "Testing Out Contractual Incompleteness: Evidence from Soccer," Departmental Working Papers 200501, Rutgers University, Department of Economics.
    13. Schmitz, Patrick W., 2014. "Optimal ownership of public goods reconsidered," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 125(1), pages 21-24.
    14. Schmitz, Patrick W., 2019. "Incomplete contracts, limited liability, and the optimality of joint ownership," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 183(C), pages 1-1.
    15. Schmitz, Patrick W., 2013. "Investments in physical capital, relationship-specificity, and the property rights approach," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 119(3), pages 336-339.
    16. Dessi, Roberta, 2009. "Contractual Execution, Strategic Incompleteness and Venture Capital," TSE Working Papers 09-075, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    17. Fares, M’hand, 2005. "Quels fondements à l’incomplétude des contrats?," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 81(3), pages 535-555, Septembre.
    18. Lorenzo Sacconi, 2002. "The efficiency of the non-profit enterprise: constitutional ideology, conformist preferences and reputation," LIUC Papers in Ethics, Law and Economics 110, Cattaneo University (LIUC).
    19. Chatterjee Kalyan & Chiu Y. Stephen, 2007. "When Does Competition Lead to Efficient Investments?," The B.E. Journal of Theoretical Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 7(1), pages 1-39, July.
    20. Takashi Kunimoto, 2010. "Indescribability and its irrelevance for contractual incompleteness," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 14(3), pages 271-289, September.

    More about this item

    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:liu:liuced:91. 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: Laura Ballestra (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/liuccit.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.