Civic Engagement as a Second-Order Public Good: The Cooperative Underpinnings of the Accountable State

Jean-Robert Tyran, Kenju Kamei and Louis Putterman

No 13985, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers

Abstract: Effective states provide public goods by taxing their citizens and imposing penalties for non-compliance. However, accountable government requires that enough citizens are civically engaged. We study the voluntary cooperative underpinnings of the accountable state by conducting a two-level public goods experiment in which civic engagement can build a sanction scheme to solve the first-order public goods dilemma. We find that civic engagement can be sustained at high levels when costs are low relative to the benefits of public good provision. This cost-to-benefit differential yields what we call a “leverage effect†because it transforms modest willingness to cooperate into the larger social dividend from the power of taxation. In addition, we find that local social interaction among subgroups of participants also boosts cooperation.

Keywords: Civic engagement; Public goods provision; Experiment; Cooperation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C92 D02 D72 H41 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-exp, nep-gth and nep-soc
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Working Paper: Civic Engagement as a Second-Order Public Good: The Cooperative Underpinnings of the Accountable State (2019)
Working Paper: Civic Engagement as a Second-Order Public Good: The Cooperative Underpinnings of the Accountable State (2019)
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