Self-Organization for Collective Action: An Experimental Study of Voting on Sanction Regimes

Autor(en)

Thomas Markussen, Louis Putterman, Jean-Robert Tyran

Abstrakt

Entrusting the power to punish to a central authority is a hallmark of civilization, yet informal or horizontal sanctions have attracted more attention of late. We study experimentally a collective action dilemma and test whether subjects choose a formal sanction scheme that costs less than the surplus it makes possible, as predicted by standard economic theory, or instead opt for the use of informal sanctions (IS) or no sanctions. Our subjects choose, and succeed in using, IS surprisingly often, their voting decisions being responsive to the cost of formal sanctions. Adoption by voting enhances the efficiency of both IS and non-deterrent formal sanctions. Results are qualitatively confirmed under several permutations of the experimental design.

Organisation(en)

Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, Wiener Zentrum für Experimentelle Wirtschaftsforschung

Externe Organisation(en)

University of Copenhagen, Brown University

Journal

Review of Economic Studies

Band

81

Seiten

301-324

Anzahl der Seiten

24

ISSN

0034-6527

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1093/restud/rdt022

Publikationsdatum

01-2014

Peer-reviewed

Ja

ÖFOS 2012

502045 Verhaltensökonomie

Schlagwörter

ASJC Scopus Sachgebiete

Economics and Econometrics

Link zum Portal

https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/de/publications/feb1e8f5-59bf-413d-9523-9b97f327c707