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Larger groups may alleviate collective action problems

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  • Sung-Ha Hwang

    (Department of Economics, Sogang University, Seoul)

Abstract

This paper shows how larger group size can enhance punishing behavior in social dilemmas and hence support higher levels of cooperation. This occurs when agents can punish fellow group members who violate cooperative norms. Unlike existing approaches that focus on decentralized punishment, I view punishment to be a collective activity and show that pun- ishers can ?divide and conquer?defectors more e¢´ectively as the size of the group increases. To describe the punishment activities more precisely I develop a con?ict model which gener- alizes Lanchester?s equations - equations which describe the time evolution of the strengths of two competing armies.

Suggested Citation

  • Sung-Ha Hwang, 2011. "Larger groups may alleviate collective action problems," Working Papers 1113, Nam Duck-Woo Economic Research Institute, Sogang University (Former Research Institute for Market Economy).
    • Handle: RePEc:sgo:wpaper:1113
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Chamberlin, John, 1974. "Provision of Collective Goods As a Function of Group Size," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 68(2), pages 707-716, June.
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    6. R. Mark Isaac & James M. Walker, 1988. "Group Size Effects in Public Goods Provision: The Voluntary Contributions Mechanism," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 103(1), pages 179-199.
    7. Bagnoli, Mark & McKee, Michael, 1991. "Voluntary Contribution Games: Efficient Private Provision of Public Goods," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 29(2), pages 351-366, April.
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    9. Kandori, Michihiro & Mailath, George J & Rob, Rafael, 1993. "Learning, Mutation, and Long Run Equilibria in Games," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 61(1), pages 29-56, January.
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    11. Simon Gachter & Ernst Fehr, 2000. "Cooperation and Punishment in Public Goods Experiments," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(4), pages 980-994, September.
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    Cited by:

    1. Newton, Jonathan & Angus, Simon D., 2015. "Coalitions, tipping points and the speed of evolution," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 172-187.
    2. Newton, Jonathan, 2012. "Coalitional stochastic stability," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 75(2), pages 842-854.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Collective action; group size; collective punishment; Lanchester?s equation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H41 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Public Goods
    • D74 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Conflict; Conflict Resolution; Alliances; Revolutions

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