Tournaments consisting of iterative matches are a common mechanism for determining how to allocate a prize. While participants are focused on their own outcomes, tournament organizers often have objectives such as maximizing the total investment or effort by the participants over the course of...

Commitment problems are inherent to non-binding conflict resolution mechanisms, since an unsatisfied party can ignore the resolution and initiate conflict. We provide experimental evidence suggesting that even in the absence of binding contractual agreements individuals often avoid conflict by...

Due to the high costs of conflict both in theory and practice, we examine and experimentally test the conditions under which conflict between asymmetric agents can be resolved. We model conflict as a two-agent rent-seeking contest for an indivisible prize. Before conflict arises, both agents may...

Due to the high costs of conflict both in theory and practice, we examine and experimentally test the conditions under which conflict between asymmetric agents can be resolved. We model conflict as a two-agent rent-seeking contest for an indivisible prize. Before conflict arises, both agents may...

We develop a unifying explanation for prosocial behavior. We argue that people care not about others’ payoffs per se, but whether their own behavior accords with social norms. Individuals who are sensitive to norms will adhere to them so long as they observe others doing the same. A model...

Donations and volunteerism can be conceived as market transactions with zero explicit price. However, evidence suggests people may not view zero as just another price when it comes to pro-­social behavior. Thus, while markets might be expected to increase the supply of assets available to those...

Rules are thought to persist to the extent that the direct benefits of having them (e.g. reduced transactions costs) exceed the costs of enforcement and of occasional misapplications. We argue that a second crucial role of rules is as screening mechanisms for identifying cooperative types. Thus...

Due to the high costs of conflict both in theory and practice, we examine and experimentally test the conditions under which conflict between asymmetric agents can be resolved. We model conflict as a two-agent rent-seeking contest for an indivisible prize. Before conflict arises, both agents may...

Conflict and competition often impose costs on both winners and losers, and conflicting parties may prefer to resolve the dispute before it occurs. The equilibrium of a conflict game with side-payments predicts that with binding offers, proposers make and responders accept side-payments,...

In laboratory asset markets, subjects trade shares of a firm whose profits in a linked product market determine dividends. Treatments vary whether dividend information is revealed once per period or in real-time and whether the firm is controlled by a profit-maximizing robot or human subject....