We analyse free-riding behaviour of Finnish municipalities prior to voluntary municipal mergers. The merger process creates a temporary common pool problem, because of a delay from the initial decision to the actual merger during which municipalities stay autonomous. Using a...

Social preferences for the punishment of free riders are critical for generating cooperative behavior in human society. Focusing on the receiving fees of Japan's public broadcaster, this study analyses how punishment of free riders, that is, the strengthening of legal responses against them,...

We use an experiment to test the hypothesis that groups consisting of like-minded cooperators are able to cooperate irrespective of punishment and therefore have a lower demand for a costly punishment institution than groups of like-minded free riders, who are unable to cooperate without...