Norms as emergent properties of adaptive learning: The case of economic routines

Interaction among autonomous decision-makers is usually modelled in economics in game-theoretic terms or within the framework of General Equilibrium. Game-theoretic and General Equilibrium models deal almost exclusively with the existence of equilibria and do not analyse the processes which might lead to them. Even when existence proofs can be given, two questions are still open. The first concerns the possibility of multiple equilibria, which game theory has shown to be the case even in very simple models and which makes the outcome of interaction unpredictable. The second relates to the computability and complexity of the decision procedures which agents should adopt and questions the possibility of reaching an equilibrium by means of an algorithmically implementable strategy. Some theorems have recently proved that in many economically relevant problems equilibria are not computable. A different approach to the problem of strategic interaction is a “constructivist” one. Such a perspective, instead of being based upon an axiomatic view of human behaviour grounded on the principle of optimisation, focuses on algorithmically implementable “satisfycing” decision procedures. Once the axiomatic approach has been abandoned, decision procedures cannot be deduced from rationality assumptions, but must be the evolving outcome of a process of learning and adaptation to the particular environment in which the decision must be made. This paper considers one of the most recently proposed adaptive learning models: Genetic Programming and applies it to one the mostly studied and still controversial economic interaction environment, that of oligopolistic markets. Genetic Programming evolves decision procedures, represented by elements in the space of functions, balancing the exploitation of knowledge previously obtained with the search of more productive procedures. The results obtained are consistent with the evidence from the observation of the behaviour of real economic agents.     

Norms in conflict and confusion: Six stories in search of an author

Political conflict involves the conflict of norms; yet resolution of political conflict requires that the disputants share some norms about conflict resolution. This presents a problem at the global level, where no such shared normative framework exists. The world is increasingly interconnected; yet the peoples of the world continue to embrace ideas of separateness which are reinforced by their various normative systems. The authors identify six major “stories”—worldviews or paradigms—competing in the current postmodern world: the Western-style mystique of progress, Christian fundamentalism, Islamic fundamentalism, Marxist revolutionary ideology, Green politics, and the “new paradigm.” Each of this is in conflict with other normative systems, and none is adequate to serve as the normative framework for a global society. Whether or not such a society emerges depends on whether, as a fundamental characteristic, there exists an ability to deal with information—not only data and concepts, but also “meta-information” about the uses and limitations of information. Whatever the norms of a global information culture, its emergence will be accompanied by a protracted period of conflict and great stress for individuals and institutions of governance.     

Cooperation Norms in Multiple‐Stage Punishment

We analyze the interplay between cooperation norms and people’s punishment behavior in a social‐dilemma game with multiple punishment stages. By combining multiple punishment stages with self‐contained episodes of interaction, we are able to disentangle the effects of retaliation and norm‐related punishment. An additional treatment provides information on the norms bystanders use in judging punishment actions. Partly confirming previous findings, punishment behavior and bystanders’ opinions are guided by an absolute norm. This norm is consistent over decisions and punishment stages and requires full contributions. In the first punishment stage, our results suggest a higher personal involvement of punishers, leading to a nonlinearity defined by the punishers’ contribution. In later punishment stages, the personal‐involvement effect vanishes and retaliation kicks in. Bystanders generally apply the same criteria as punishers in all stages.     

Social Norms and Private Provision of Public Goods

The formation of social norms for voluntary contributions to a public good is analyzed in a game in which people have preferences for private consumption, a public good, and social approval. Each person chooses to be one of the two types: a contributor or a non‐contributor. Thereafter, each person meets people who can observe his type. A non‐contributor feels disapproval, whereas a contributor feels approval if he believes that a contributor observes his type. The game has two asymptotically stable states: one in which everybody is a contributor, and one in which nobody is a contributor. Governmental subsidization of the public good can move the society to the former state, whereas a governmental contribution to the public good can move the society to the latter. Indeed, this crowding in or crowding out prevails even after policy reversal.     

An introduction to the symposium on behavioral game theory

This article introduces the articles contained in the symposium on behavioral game theory. I break economic experiments studying game theory into three broad classes: (1) experiments studying and possibly modifying the assumptions that serve as foundations for game theory; (2) experiments that perform economic engineering, testing existing institutions with the aim of designing better ones; and (3) experiments designed to test theories which apply game theory to fields such as industrial organization.      

The new institutional economics and its relevance to social economics

There has been a quiet revolution in economic theory, led by the New Institutionalists. Pioneered by Douglass C. North, this group argues that institutions are the main determinants of economic performance, yet neoclassical economics has no role for institutions. Contrary to many misconceptions, this theory of institutions can be integrated with neoclassical economics, leaving mainstream economic theory in tact, but broader and more relevant. The purpose of this article is twofold. First, the main arguments of the New Institutionalists are summarized. Second, the bridge between institutions and social economics is explored. The article concludes by arguing that the New Institutional approach is fruitful, and that the theory will gradually be integrated with neoclassical economics, until the two merge into a single body of theory.     

Evolutionary stability of social norms in a socioeconomic equilibrium model

A hybrid of a model of economic equilibrium in two markets and a social game is formed. The link between the two is established through a social norm that conditions correct social behavior on economic variables and therefore distorts the economic equilibrium allocation. The initial endowment of an individual determines whether she gains from a social norm. The evolution of norms is examined in a dynamic model where norms are more likely to persist if they deliver higher utility to their believers. Also it is assumed that norms lose importance when they are disobeyed by their believers. Optimally coordinating norms are not necessarily evolutionarily stable, and a suboptimal norm can be the outcome of the evolutionary process.     

Social Norms and the Time Allocation of Women's Labor in Burkina Faso

This paper proposes that major determinants of allocation of women's time are social norms that regulate the economic activities of women. The emphasis on norms contrasts with approaches that view time allocation as determined by household-level economic variables. Using data from Burkina Faso, it is shown that social norms significantly explain differences in patterns of time allocation between two ethnic groups: Mossi and Bwa. Econometric results show women from the two groups exhibiting different responses to changes in farm capital. Implications are that policies changing social norms may have more permanent effects on altering women's behavior.     

Economic Properties of Statistical Indices: The Case of a Multidimensional Gini Index

This paper seeks to construct a Gini index of the distribution of standard of living. Since standard of living has various dimensions, we need a multidimensional Gini index (MGI). The literature on index numbers contains two distinct approaches: the statistical and the economic. In the context of MGIs the statistical approach (which obtains the indices from conditions based on statistical or data-related considerations) seems to be open to the criticism that it sometimes yields indices that violate economic norms. However, the economic approach (where the indices are derived from norms based on economic theory) also does not seem to have succeeded so far in obtaining an MGI satisfying the various normative requirements that have been proposed in the literature. This paper shows that it is possible to obtain an MGI from the statistical approach ensuring, at the same time, that the economic norms are satisfied. In this sense it is an attempt to bring the two disparate traditions in index construction referred to above closer to each other. The index that is developed here does not appear in the existing literature. Moreover, the literature does not seem to contain any other MGI satisfying all of the proposed economic norms.

     

Optimal Redistribution with Endogenous Social Norms

In this paper, we examine the effect of social norms on redistributive policies, where social norms are reflected in the degree of work participation among the different skill classes. Participation is driven both by the material incentives and heterogeneous preferences for leisure of each skill class, and by an endogenous social norm. Results for optimal redistributive taxation show that when the social norm enters as a benefit or cost for participants, participation taxes are generally lower than in its absence. Multiple participation equilibria can occur, and an engineered shift from a low‐ to a high‐participation equilibrium can be Pareto‐improving in the long run.     

Forging new relationships: Social capital in the transistion

A theory of transitional economies is now emerging, much of which is evolutionary-institutional in nature and hence very critical of the naïveté of socalled shock therapy and the economic reasoning that supported it. Indeed it has become apparent that changing the formal rules of the game, difficult as this may be, is far from sufficient. The informal rules of the game, the customs and norms of the social order, are critical to the operation of the economy. These informal rules are often implicit or tacit, and therefore very difficult to reach on a policy level. This paper seeks to apply the concept of social capital to the transitional economic process using the former Soviet republic of Russia to draw attention to the complex issues of governance and legitimacy that are too often neglected in economic discourse.     

Conventions: An evolutionary approach

Conventions are social institutions that solve recurrent coordination problems. In normative game theory, coordination games are considered problematic because of the multiplicity of equilibria. From a neoinstitutionalist perspective, however, this multiplicity should be an important part of the explanation of real-world institutions. The paper discusses the evolutionary (or “positive”) game-theoretical approach to the emergence of conventions. I note a precise sense in which conventions may be said to minimize transaction costs, but that they need not be efficient. Example applications to language, money, and the theory of the firm are discussed.     

A theory of cooperation in games with an application to market socialism

Abstract

Economic theory has focused almost exclusively on how humans compete with each other in their economic activity, culminating in general equilibrium (Walras–Arrow–Debreu) and game theory (Cournot–Nash). Cooperation in economic activity is, however, important, and is virtually ignored. Because our models influence our view of the world, this theoretical lacuna biases economists’ interpretation of economic behavior. Here, I propose models that provide micro-foundations for how cooperation is decentralized by economic agents. It is incorrect, in particular, to view competition as decentralized and cooperation as organized only by central diktat. My approach is not to alter preferences, which is the strategy behavioral economists have adopted to model cooperation, but rather to alter the way that agents optimize. Whereas Nash optimizers view other players in the game as part of the environment (parameters), Kantian optimizers view them as part of action. When formalized, this approach resolves the two major failures of Nash optimization from a welfare viewpoint – the Pareto inefficiency of equilibria in common-pool resource problems (the tragedy of the commons) and the inefficiency of equilibria in public-good games (the free rider problem). An application to market socialism shows that the problems of efficiency and distribution can be completely separated: the dead-weight loss of taxation disappears.     

On the Regulation of Social Norms

A model is developed to understand how norms can be influencedby "norm entrepreneurs," for example, lawmakers, governmentagencies, unions, etc. Two instruments of influencing the dynamicsof norm-following behavior are analyzed, namely transformingthe (monetary) incentives and changing the meaning or the reputationalvalue of following a norm. Both forms of norm regulation areincorporated into Akerlof's model of social custom (1980), andthe comparative static properties of norm destruction and normcreation for different types of norms are derived. In particular,it is shown how norms should be regulated when almost everybodyfollows them and when they take the form of bandwagon and snobnorms.     

The emergence of institutions in Hayek’s theory: two views or one?

Hayek opposes the explanation of the emergence of institutions as “spontaneous (unintentional) order”, which he considers correct, against “constructivism” (viewed as erroneous). This dichotomy exhibits some inconsistencies, for, on Hayek’s account, constructivist ideologies seem able both to prevent the evolutionary emergence of norms and to generate institutions coherent with deliberate, intentional, purposes. If this is so, are there then two views on the emergence of institutions in Hayek’s theory? The paper consequently discusses whether constructivism and evolution of norms are two alternative kinds of explanation, and in particular whether the former can be interpreted in evolutionary terms.     

Incomplete information in the acid rain game

This paper provides a model that attempts to deal with the transboundary nature of the acid rain problem, using a game theoretic approach consistent with mainstream economic theory. The general forms of cooperative and non cooperative equilibria in explicit and implicit set-up of the model are presented under the assumptions of complete and incomplete information.     

Gender Inequality,Endogenous Cultural Norms,and Economic Development

In this paper, I explore the joint dynamics between gender inequality and cultural norms along the process of development. Cultural norms regarding gender roles are shaped by the relative female labor supply, and thus depend on the gender gap in education. In turn, these norms influence the relative education provided to boys and girls. I show that this two‐way causality between the inegalitarian nature of norms and the educational gender gap might explain the emergence of high gender inequality and low development traps. The model also makes it possible to replicate a U‐shaped relationship between the relative status of women and the economic development.     

Monetary Integration and Economic Reform

Recent research in contract theory views ownership as a substitute for complete contracts. Here, this approach is applied to monetary integration. Countries face a coordination problem conducting monetary policy. Negative spillovers ensure uncoordinated policy generates too high inflation. Ex ante , policy makers can undertake politically costly economic reform. This has a positive spillover because it improves the outcome of the monetary policy game. Ex-post contracting over policy may be possible, but it supposed that ex-ante contracting over reform and monetary policy is not. This paper analyses when monetary union is a good substitute for this inability to commit.     

International order and individual liberty

This article takes issue with the traditional way of conceptualizing international relations as anarchy. While the “anarchy problematique” has become established wisdom of neorealist (structuralist) international relations theory, neither the historical record, nor the analytical power, of this approach is borne out by closer examination. The elimination of questions concerning individual liberty, and the exclusion from analysis of international and domestic institutions serving this end, have been pursued in the vain hope of formulating a systematic and parsimonious theory of international politics. p ]On the basis of an examination of the post-war era, in which issues of stable democratic regimes and liberal international institutions were of primary importance, this article suggests an alternative approach for the study of international politics. By conceptualizing both the domestic and international systems associal systems, differing in degree and kind of institutionalized behavior, particular attention is directed to the link between individual rights and domestic institutions, as well as to the linkage of domestic and international structures. The metaphor of a “game,” constituted by rules and norms, is particularly helpful in providing an alternative research program. This approach is not only more attuned to political practice, it also allows for the stringent examination of normative questions. In preparing this paper, I was helped by the support of the Liberty Fund and by my research assistant, Rey Koslowski. I also thank colleagues Joe Grieco, Joseph Nye, Michaela Richter, David Spiro as well as two anonymous referees of this journal who provided helpful suggestions. Lawrence B. Simon Professor of Political Science; University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104-6215.     

Dictators and oligarchs: A dynamic theory of contested property rights

In an economy with weak economic and political institutions, the major institutional choices are made strategically by oligarchs and dictators. The conventional wisdom presumes that as rent-seeking is harmful for oligarchs themselves, institutions such as property rights will emerge spontaneously. We explicitly model a dynamic game between the oligarchs and a dictator who can contain rent-seeking. The oligarchs choose either a weak dictator (who can be overthrown by an individual oligarch) or a strong dictator (who can only be replaced via a consensus of oligarchs). In equilibrium, no dictator can commit to both: (i) protecting the oligarchs' property rights from the other oligarchs and (ii) not expropriating oligarchs himself. We show that a weak dictator does not limit rent-seeking. A strong dictator does reduce rent-seeking but also expropriates individual oligarchs. We show that even though eliminating rent-seeking is Pareto optimal, weak dictators do get appointed in equilibrium and rent-seeking continues. This outcome is especially likely when economic environment is highly volatile.