The aim of the paper is to analyze a model of local public good provision with positive interjurisdictional spillovers comparing decentralized and centralized system. As in the recent Second Generation Theory (SGT) of fiscal federalism (Seabright 1996; Lockwood 2002, 2006; Besley and Coate 2003; Weingast...

Economic and social interaction takes place between individuals with heterogeneous characteristics. We investigate experimentally the emergence and informal enforcement of different contribution norms to a public good in homogeneous and different heterogeneous groups. When punishment is not...

Using data from 1988 to 2007, we examine to what extent bilateral aid flows of an individual donor to a country depend on aid flows from all other bilateral and multilateral donors to that country. We thereby want to assess to what extent donor coordination, free-riding, selectivity,...

This paper proposes an explanation of why union membership has been increasing in some occupations, despite the opportunity to freeride on traditional union benefits. I model membership as legal insurance whose demand increases with the perceived risk of allegations. Using media reports on...

This paper studies the formation of self-enforcing global environmental agreements in a world economy with international trade and two groups of countries that differ with respect to fuel demand and environmental damage. It investigates whether the signatories' threat to embargo (potential) free...

We augment the standard cartel formation game from non-cooperative coalition theory, often applied in the context of international environmental agreements on climate change, with the possibility that singletons support coalition formation without becoming coalition members themselves. Rather,...

Field-experimental studies have shown that people litter more in more littered environments. Inspired by these findings, many cities around the world have adopted policies to quickly remove litter. While such policies may prevent people from following the bad example of litterers, they may also...

This paper considers the endogenous formation of an institution to provide a public good. If the institution governs only its members, players have an incentive to free ride on the institution formation of others and the social dilemma is simply shifted to a higher level. Addressing this...