 Barrett's paradox of cooperation: A full analytical proof 30 years afterMichael Finus, Francesco Furini and Anna Viktoria Rohrer Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, 2024, vol. 128, issue C Abstract: In his seminal paper, Barrett (1994) argues that international environmental agreements (IEAs) are typically not successful, which he coined "the paradox of cooperation". If the potential gains from full cooperation would be large, self-enforcing IEAs have low participation and, therefore, cannot achieve much, or, if the potential gains are small, agreements are not important, even though IEAs may enjoy large participation. This message has been reiterated by several subsequent papers. Even though these papers explain the driving forces of the paradox, the analysis of membership in stable agreements and the actual and potential gains from cooperation are still mainly based on simulations. In this paper, we provide a full analytical characterization of all items on which the paradox of cooperation is based. Keywords: International environmental agreements; Stability; Paradox of cooperation (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:eee:jeeman:v:128:y:2024:i:c:s0095069624001190 DOI: 10.1016/j.jeem.2024.103045 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Environmental Economics and Management is currently edited by M.A. Cole, A. Lange, D.J. Phaneuf, D. Popp, M.J. Roberts, M.D. Smith, C. Timmins, Q. Weninger and A.J. Yates More articles in Journal of Environmental Economics and Management from Elsevier |
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