Dissertation abstract: Reputational benefits of altruism and altruistic punishment

Recent studies in experimental economics have shown that many people have other-regarding preferences, potentially including preferences for altruism, reciprocity, and fairness. It is useful to investigate why people possess such preferences and what functional purpose they might serve outside the laboratory, because evolutionary and social learning perspectives both predict that cooperative sentiments should only exist if they bring benefits that outweigh the costs of other-regarding behavior. Theories of costly signaling suggest that altruistic acts may function (with or without intention) as signals of unobservable qualities such as resources or cooperative intent, and altruists may benefit (possibly unintentionally) from the advertisement of such qualities. After reviewing the theories that could potentially account for the evolution of altruism (Chapter 1), I test some predictions about cooperation derived from costly signaling theory. In Chapter 2, I show that participants in experimental public goods games were more cooperative when they had cues that they could benefit from having a good reputation, and that there was apparently some competition to be the most generous group member. Furthermore, in subsequent trust games, people tended to trust high public goods contributors more than low contributors. Chapter 3 failed to find evidence that granting high status to people makes them more likely to contribute to public goods or punish free-riders, but there was suggestive evidence that physical proximity to the experimenter affected contributions and punishment. In Chapter 4, I found that people tended to trust others who were willing to incur costs to punish those who free-ride on group cooperation provided that such punishment was justified, and men were more punitive than women. In Chapter 5, I show that women find altruistic men more desirable than neutral men for long-term relationships. Together, these results suggest that humans do treat altruism as a signal of willingness to be cooperative. These findings are discussed with respect to the adaptive design of cooperative sentiments as well as the current debate over group selection. Dissertation: Department of Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontarion Currently: Post-Doc, Department of Neurobiology & Behavior, Cornell University     

Why Punish? Social reciprocity and the enforcement of prosocial norms

Recently economists have become interested in why people who face social dilemmas in the experimental lab use the seemingly incredible threat of punishment to deter free riding. Three theories with evolutionary microfoundations have been developed to explain punishment. We survey these theories and use behavioral data from surveys and experiments to show that the theory called social reciprocity in which people punish norm violators indiscriminately explains punishment best.JEL Classification: C91, C92, D64, H41 Correspondence to: Jeffrey P. CarpenterWe thank Carolyn Craven, Corinna Noelke and two referees for comments, and Middlebury College for financial assistance. In addition, Carpenter acknowledges the support of the National Science Foundation (SES-CAREER 0092953).     

论学校违纪处分的司法审查

受教育权是公民的一项受宪法保护的基本权利,当其受到不当行为侵害时理应得到司法的有效救济.学校具备行政主体资格,其违纪处分权是一种教育行政管理权,不当或违法的违纪处分侵犯了学生的合法权益.因此,学生不服学校违纪处分所产生的纠纷应该纳入行政诉讼受案范围.同时为了保障学校教育的自治权,行政诉讼应该遵守行政复议前置和司法审查有限两项原则.     

Sustaining cooperation in social dilemmas: Comparison of centralized punishment institutions

This study investigates two centralized punishment institutions for a linear public goods game. These institutions require a certain contribution level and sanction under-contributing players. The two differ in who, among those who do not meet this requirement, receive sanctions. In one institution, all violators are sanctioned, and in the other, only the worst violator(s) is sanctioned. Theoretically, the public goods game of the latter institution yields contributions equal to or greater than that of the former institution with the same requirement and sanction level. The results of an experiment support this theoretical prediction. However, there is a discrepancy between the theory and laboratory observations in that the institution with the theoretically optimal requirement did not yield the highest profit.     

完善国家助学贷款机制的再思考

国家助学贷款是一项造福社会和贫困学子的公益事业,其意义的重大毋庸置疑。但是国家助学贷款发展缓慢,贷款的发放与经济困难学生的需求有较大差距,学生贷款违约与商业银行惜贷问题较为严重。本文客观分析了制约我国国家助学贷款发展的因素,并提出完善我国国家助学贷款机制的对策建议。     

对国际卡特尔的有效惩罚额度研究

对国际卡特尔行为实施有效威慑的一个关键问题是如何确立惩罚额度。本文认为，无论是以美国为代表的3倍损失赔偿，还是以欧盟为代表的单倍损失赔偿，都不是合理的惩罚标准。对国际卡特尔的合理的惩罚额度应使卡特尔成员承担其非法行为所带来的全部社会成本，包括国际卡特尔的超高定价、社会净损失、调查诉讼成本以及监禁成本。     

When punishment fails: Research on sanctions, intentions and non-cooperation

People can become less cooperative when threatened with sanctions, and previous research suggests both “intentions” and incentives underlie this effect. We report data from an experiment aimed at determining the relative importance of intentions and incentives in producing non-cooperative behavior. Participants play a one-shot investment experiment in pairs. Investors send an amount to trustees, request a return on this investment and, in some treatments, can threaten sanctions to enforce their requests. Decisions by trustees facing threats imposed (or not) by investors are compared to decisions by trustees facing threats imposed (or not) by nature. When not threatened, trustees typically decide to return a positive amount less than the investor requested. When threatened this decision becomes least common. If the request is large relative to the sanction then most trustees return nothing. If the request is small, trustees typically return the requested amount. These results do not vary with investors' intentions.     

论废除死刑的法律价值

我国的死刑制度历史悠久,改革现行死刑制度,对于我国构建和谐社会具有重要现实意义.我国死刑制度具有局限性,因此,废除死刑,构建合理的刑罚体系是十分必要的.     

军民融合技术协同创新行为分析

以军工企业和民用企业为研究对象,利用演化博弈模型研究军民融合协同行为的动态演化过程,分析双方在有限理性条件下的互动机理与策略选择,探寻支配双方协同创新的制约因素及影响机理。在此基础上,通过政府激励与契约惩处情景的设定,引入约束体系,构建奖惩机制下军民融合协同博弈理论模型,确定最优发展策略（协同创新,协同创新）状态稳定时奖励金与惩罚金的范围,对于构建军民融合协同创新体系具有一定参考价值和现实指导意义。     

行政处罚种类扩张论批判

在此次《行政处罚法》修订过程中,处罚种类扩张论得到广泛支持。学者们将实践中出现的一些新型行为措施定性为行政处罚,并且基于提升公共治理能力、规范行政公权力的良好愿景,主张扩张处罚种类。修订通过后的《行政处罚法》有限度地扩张了处罚种类。然而,从行政处罚内涵和立法政策两个方面进行考察可以发现,处罚种类扩张论并不合理。一方面,通过考察刑罚处罚的特征和狭义行政管理权与行政处罚权之区别可以发现,科处额外负担和非难是处罚的本质要素,典型非处罚行为应当排除在行政处罚之外。另一方面,提升公共治理能力与扩张行政处罚种类并无直接关系,为了规范公权力而扩张处罚种类之考量也将随着行政法制的不断完善而逐渐式微,贸然扩张处罚种类可能造成法律适用上的障碍,因而中间类型行为不宜纳入处罚种类。确立“少而精”的处罚种类,才有利于实现对行政处罚的专业性精准规制。