Club Mormon

Michael McBride ()

Rationality and Society, 2007, vol. 19, issue 4, 395-424

Abstract: The Mormon Church is best understood as a club, in the economics sense of the term. It succeeds, in part, because it identifies and selectively rewards high contributors, thereby limiting free-riding and producing large religious benefits for its members. First, it offers a menu of club goods of varying excludability, with the most valued goods excluded from less-committed members. Second, to enforce this menu, it actively monitors its members using a sophisticated administrative structure. The menu design reflects to an extent the costs of excludability of various religious goods, and the menu-monitoring approach implicitly allows some free-riding to dynamically foster commitment. Because the menu-monitoring approach is best understood as complementing other methods in achieving the Mormon Church's religious goals, these findings yield insights into the activities of other religious groups.

Keywords: religion; game theory; rational choice; organization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:ratsoc:v:19:y:2007:i:4:p:395-424

DOI: 10.1177/1043463107083736

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