A comprehensive and current presentation of the collective-action approach

How do groups form, how do institutions come into being, and when do moral norms and practices emerge? This volume explores how game-theoretic approaches can be extended to consider broader questions that cross scales of organization, from individuals to cooperatives to societies. Game theory' strategic formulation of central problems in the analysis of social interactions is used to develop multi-level theories that examine the interplay between individuals and the collectives they form. The concept of cooperation is examined at a higher level than that usually addressed by game theory, especially focusing on the formation of groups and the role of social norms in maintaining their integrity, with positive and negative implications. The authors suggest that conventional analyses need to be broadened to explain how heuristics, like concepts of fairness, arise and become formalized into the ethical principles embraced by a society.

Recent applications of evolutionary game theory in the merging fields of the mathematical and social sciences are brilliantly portrayed in this book, which highlights social physics and shows how the approach can help to quantitatively model complex human–environmental–social systems. First, readers are introduced to the fundamentals of evolutionary game theory. The two-player, two-strategy game, or the 2 × 2 game, is presented as an archetype to help understand the difficulty of cooperating for survival against defection in common social contexts. Subsequently, the book explains the theoretical background of the multi-player, two-strategy game, which may be more widely applicable than the 2 × 2 game for social dilemmas. The latest applications of 2 × 2 games are also discussed to explore how integrated reciprocity mechanisms can solve social dilemmas. In turn, the book describes two practical areas in which evolutionary game theory has been applied. The first concerns traffic flow analysis. In conventional interpretations, traffic flow can be understood by means of fluid dynamics, in which the flow of vehicles is evaluated as a continuum body. Such a simple idea, however, does not work well in reality, particularly if a driver’s decision-making process is considered. Various dilemmas involve complex structures that depend primarily on traffic density, a revelation that should help establish a practical solution for reducing traffic congestion. Second, the book provides keen insights into how powerful evolutionary game theory can be in the context of epidemiology. Both approaches, quasi-analytical and multi-agent simulation, can clarify how an infectious disease such as seasonal influenza spreads across a complex social network, which is significantly affected by the public attitude toward vaccination. A methodology is proposed for the optimum design of a public vaccination policy incorporating subsidies to efficiently increase vaccination coverage while minimizing the social cost.

This book aims to pave the way for a new interdisciplinary approach to global cooperation research. It does so by bringing in disciplines whose insights about human behaviour might provide a crucial yet hitherto neglected foundation for understanding how and under which conditions global cooperation can succeed. As the first profoundly interdisciplinary book dealing with global cooperation, it provides the state of the art on human cooperation in selected disciplines (evolutionary anthropology and biology, decision-sciences, social psychology, complex system sciences), written by leading experts. The book argues that scholars in the field of global governance should know and could learn from what other disciplines tell us about the capabilities and limits of humans to cooperate. This new knowledge will generate food for thought and cause creative disturbances, allowing us a different interpretation of the obstacles to cooperation observed in world politics today. It also offers first accounts of interdisciplinary global cooperation research, for instance by exploring the possibilities and consequences of global we-identities, by describing the basic cooperation mechanism that are valid across disciplines, or by bringing an evolutionary perspective to diplomacy. This book will be of great interest to scholars and postgraduates in International Relations, Global Governance and International Development.

Deeply rooted in fundamental research in Mathematics and Computer Science, Cellular Automata (CA) are recognized as an intuitive modeling paradigm for Complex Systems. Already very basic CA, with extremely simple micro dynamics such as the Game of Life, show an almost endless display of complex emergent behavior. Conversely, CA can also be designed to produce a desired emergent behavior, using either theoretical methodologies or evolutionary techniques. Meanwhile, beyond the original realm of applications - Physics, Computer Science, and Mathematics – CA have also become work horses in very different disciplines such as epidemiology, immunology, sociology, and finance. In this context of fast and impressive progress, spurred further by the enormous attraction these topics have on students, this book emerges as a welcome overview of the field for its practitioners, as well as a good starting point for detailed study on the graduate and post-graduate level. The book contains three parts, two major parts on theory and applications, and a smaller part on software. The theory part contains fundamental chapters on how to design and/or apply CA for many different areas. In the applications part a number of representative examples of really using CA in a broad range of disciplines is provided - this part will give the reader a good idea of the real strength of this kind of modeling as well as the incentive to apply CA in their own field of study. Finally, we included a smaller section on software, to highlight the important work that has been done to create high quality problem solving environments that allow to quickly and relatively easily implement a CA model and run simulations, both on the desktop and if needed, on High Performance Computing infrastructures.

Looks at the importance of cooperation in human beings and in nature, arguing that this social tool is as important an aspect of evolution as mutation and natural selection.

Presupposing no prior knowledge of philosophy, John Benson introduces the fundamentals of environmental ethics by asking whether a concern with human well-being is an adequate basis for environmental ethics. He encourages the reader to explore this question, considering techniques used to value the environment and critically examining 'light green' to 'deep green' environmentalism. Each chapter is linked to a reading from a key thinker such as J.S. Mill and E.O. Wilson. Key features include activities and exercises, enabling readers to monitor their progress throughout the book, chapter summaries and guides to further reading.

This is an introduction to game theory and applications with an emphasis on self-discovery from the perspective of a mathematical modeller. The book deals in a unified manner with the central concepts of both classical and evolutionary game theory. The key ideas are illustrated throughout by a wide variety of well-chosen examples of both human and non-human behavior, including car pooling, price fixing, food sharing, sex allocation and competition for territories or oviposition sites. There are numerous exercises with solutions.

Brian Skyrms, author of the successful Evolution of the Social Contract (which won the prestigious Lakatos Award) has written a sequel. The book is a study of ideas of cooperation and collective action. The point of departure is a prototypical story found in Rousseau's A Discourse on Inequality. Rousseau contrasts the pay-off of hunting hare where the risk of non-cooperation is small but the reward is equally small, against the pay-off of hunting the stag where maximum cooperation is required but where the reward is so much greater. Thus, rational agents are pulled in one direction by considerations of risk and in another by considerations of mutual benefit. Written with Skyrms's characteristic clarity and verve, this intriguing book will be eagerly sought out by students and professionals in philosophy, political science, economics, sociology and evolutionary biology.

A social dilemma is a game which at first glance has only inefficient solutions. If efficient solutions are to be achieved, some kind of cooperation among the players is required. This book asks two basic questions, closely intertwined with each other: 1. How is cooperation possible among rational players in such a social dilemma? Which changes in the social context of a social dilemma situation are necessary in order for players to rationally choose the cooperative option? 2. How do real players actually behave in social dilemma situations? Do they behave "rationally" at all? Or, conversely, what kind of reasoning, attitudes, emotions, etc. shape the behavior of real players in social dilemmas? What kind of interventions, what kind of internal mechanisms within a real group may change players' willingness to cooperate? These two general questions mark the broad spectrum of the problem which has been, over the last three decades, investigated in various disciplines, and which has brought many new ideas and new observations into the study of the old question of social order in a world of born egoists. Accordingly, this volume contains contributions by biologists, sociologists, political scientists, economists, mathematicians, psychologists, and philosophers.