 The effects of punishment in dynamic public-good gamesBettina Rockenbach and Irenaeus Wolff No 106, TWI Research Paper Series from Thurgauer Wirtschaftsinstitut, Universität Konstanz Abstract: In the evolution of human cooperation, the enforcement of social norms was of vital importance. The punishment of norm violators has two aspects: to immediately harm the violator and to increase the violator’s future cooperativeness. Abundant experimental evidence has demonstrated the success of peer-to-peer punishment for the establishment of stable cooperation. Yet, these studies largely ignore the dynamic aspect: punishment not only destroys today’s resources or abilities, but also reduces the potential for future cooperativeness. If, for example, a hunter who stayed away from today’s hunt is punished physically, this is harmful not only today, but may also limit the physical strength available for tomorrow’s hunt. Thus, although the hunter may be more willing to cooperate in the future, his future potential for cooperation is reduced through the punishment. Here, we experimentally study the role of punishment for cooperation in dynamic public goods games, where past payoffs determine present contribution capabilities. We show that the beneficial role of punishment possibilities for cooperation success is highly fragile. Successful cooperation seems to hinge on the presence of a common understanding on how punishment should be used. If high-contributors punish too readily, the group likely gets on a wasteful path of punishment and retaliation. On the other hand, if punishment is administered more patiently, even initially uncooperative groups thrive. Hence, in dynamic contexts when today’s punishment also determines tomorrow’s cooperation abilities, it seems of crucial importance that groups agree on the right “dose†of sanctions for punishment to successfully support sustainable cooperation, e.g. by establishing a social norm of when and how to use punishment against free-riders . Keywords: Cooperation; Dynamic game; Punishment; Retaliation; Endowment endogeneity; Experiment (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:twi:respas:0106 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in TWI Research Paper Series from Thurgauer Wirtschaftsinstitut, Universität Konstanz Contact information at EDIRC. |
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