We consider a game played by a state sponsor of terrorism, a terrorist group, and the target of terrorist attacks. The sponsoring state wishes to see as much damage inflicted on the target of attack as possible, but wishes to avoid retaliation. To do so, his relationship with the terrorist group...

Empirical evidence suggests that banks often engage in refinancing of intrinsically insolvent debtors instead of writing of their non-performing loans. Such forbearance lending may induce soft budget constraints for the debtors, as it diminishes their incentives to thwart default. This paper...

This paper proposes a model for a certification market with an imperfect testing technology. Such a technology only assures that whenever two products are tested the higher quality product is more likely to pass than the lower quality one. When only one certifier with such testing technology is...

Some labor markets have recently developed formal signalling mechanisms, e.g. the signalling for interviews in the job market for new Ph.D. economists. We evaluate the effect of such mechanisms on two-sided matching markets by considering a game of incomplete information between firms and...

Intuitively, we expect that players who are allowed to engage in costless communication before playing a game would be foolish to agree on an inefficient equilibrium. At the same time, however, such preplay communication has been suggested as a rationale for expecting Nash equilibrium in...

This paper characterizes the equilibrium outcomes of two-stage games in which the second mover has private information and can sign renegotiable contracts with a neutral third-party. Our aim is to understand whether renegotiation-proof third-party contracts can confer a strategic advantage on...

A principal acquires information about a shock and then discloses it to an agent. After the disclosure, the principal and agent each decide whether to take costly preparatory actions that yield benefits only when the shock strikes. The principal maximizes his expected payoff by controlling the...

I study the optimal audit mechanism when the principal cannot commit to an audit strategy. Invoking a relevation principle, the agent reports her type to a mediator whi assigns contracts and recommends the principla whether to audit. For each reported type the mediator randomizes over a...

We explore in an equilibrium framework whether games with multiple Nash equilibria are easier to play when players can communicate. We consider two variants, modelling talk about future plans and talk about past actions. The language from which messages are chosen is endogenous, messages are...