Who's Who in Networks. Wanted: The Key Player

Coralio Ballester, Antoni Calvó-Armengol and Yves Zenou

Econometrica, 2006, vol. 74, issue 5, 1403-1417

Abstract: Finite population noncooperative games with linear-quadratic utilities, where each player decides how much action she exerts, can be interpreted as a network game with local payoff complementarities, together with a globally uniform payoff substitutability component and an own-concavity effect. For these games, the Nash equilibrium action of each player is proportional to her Bonacich centrality in the network of local complementarities, thus establishing a bridge with the sociology literature on social networks. This Bonacich-Nash linkage implies that aggregate equilibrium increases with network size and density. We then analyze a policy that consists of targeting the key player, that is, the player who, once removed, leads to the optimal change in aggregate activity. We provide a geometric characterization of the key player identified with an intercentrality measure, which takes into account both a player's centrality and her contribution to the centrality of the others. Copyright The Econometric Society 2006.

Date: 2006
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (728)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/j.1468-0262.2006.00709.x link to full text (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
Working Paper: Who's Who in Networks. Wanted: The Key Player (2015)
Working Paper: Who's Who in Networks. Wanted: the Key Player (2005)
Working Paper: Who?s Who in Networks. Wanted: The Key Player (2005)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ecm:emetrp:v:74:y:2006:i:5:p:1403-1417

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.economet ... ordering-back-issues

Access Statistics for this article

Econometrica is currently edited by Guido Imbens

More articles in Econometrica from Econometric Society Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().