Hostname: page-component-cb9f654ff-k7rjm Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-08-08T06:51:11.852Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Coordination versus Prisoners' Dilemma: Implications for International Cooperation and Regimes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 December 1985

Duncan Snidal
Duncan Snidal*
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The study of political institutions in general and international cooperation in particular has been beneficially influenced by the Prisoners' Dilemma (PD) game model, but there is a mistaken tendency to treat PD as representing the singular problem of collective action and cooperation. By relaxing the assumptions of 2 × 2 games and developing an alternate model of the coordination game, I show how some cooperation problems have very different properties from those found in PD. The analytical results of the two games are compared across several important dimensions: number of strategies available, number of iterations of the game, numbers of players, and the distribution of power among them. The discussion is illustrated with specific problems of international cooperation, and the implications of alternative cooperation problems for the formation and performance of international regimes are explored. The basic solutions for PD and coordination have divergent ramifications for the institutionalization, stability, and adaptability of regimes and for the role of hegemony in the international system. However, the coordination model does not replace the PD model but complements and supplements it as a way to understand the diversity of political institutions. These results are widely applicable to areas of politics beyond international relations.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 79 , Issue 4 , December 1985 , pp. 923 - 942
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1985

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Axelrod, R. The evolution of cooperation. New York: Basic Books, 1984.Google Scholar
Gordon, R., & Pelkmans, J. Challenges to interdependent economies. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1979.Google Scholar
Hamburger, H. Separable games. Behavioral Science, 1969, 14, 121–132.10.1002/bs.3830140205CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hardin, R. Collective action as an agreeable n-prison-er's dilemma. Behavioral Science, 1971, 16, 472–481.10.1002/bs.3830160507CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hardin, R. Collective action. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982.Google Scholar
Keohane, R. The theory of hegemonic stability and changes in international economic regimes, 1967-77. In Siverson, R. & George, A. (Eds.). Changes in the international system. Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1980.Google Scholar
Keohane, R. The demand for international regimes. International Organization, 1982, 36, 325–336.Google Scholar
Keohane, R. After hegemony: Cooperation and discord in the world political economy. Princeton N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984.Google Scholar
Kindleberger, C. Systems of international economic organization. In Calleo, D. (Ed.). Money and the coming world order. New York: New York University Press, 1978.Google Scholar
Krasner, S. Regimes and the limits of realism. International Organization, 1982, 36, 497–510. (b)10.1017/S0020818300019032CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krasner, S. Structural causes and regime consequences: Regimes as intervening variables. International Organization, 1982, 36, 185–206. (a)10.1017/S0020818300018920CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, D. Convention: A philosophical study. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969.Google Scholar
Lipson, C. The transformation of trade: The sources and effects of regime change. International Organization, 1982, 36, 417–456.10.1017/S0020818300019007CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Olson, M. The logic of collective action: Public goods and the theory of groups. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1965.Google Scholar
Rapoport, A., & Guyer, M. A taxonomy of 2 × 2 games. General Systems Yearbook, 1966, 11, 203–214.Google Scholar
Runge, C. F. Common property externalities: Isolation, assurance, and resource depletion in a traditional grazing context. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 1981, 63, 595–606.10.2307/1241202CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Russett, B. What price vigilance? The burden of national defense. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1981.Google Scholar
Schelling, T. The strategy of conflict. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1960.Google Scholar
Schelling, T. Micromotives and macrobehavior. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1978.Google Scholar
Sen, A. Isolation, assurance and the social rate of discount. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 1967, 81, 112–124.10.2307/1879675CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shubik, M. Game theory, behavior and the paradox of prisoners' dilemma: Three solutions. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 1970, 14, 181–193.10.1177/002200277001400204CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Snidal, D. Public goods, property rights and political organizations. International Studies Quarterly, 1979, December, 532–566.Google Scholar
Snidal, D. Interdependence, regimes and international cooperation. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University, Ph.D. dissertation, 1981.Google Scholar
Snidal, D. Limits of hegemonic stability theory. International Organization, 1985, 39, 579–614.Google Scholar
Snidal, D. The game theory of international politics. World Politics, in press.Google Scholar
Stein, A. Coordination and collaboration: Regimes in an anarchic world. International Organization, 1982, 36, 299–324.10.1017/S0020818300018968CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, M. Anarchy and cooperation. New York: Wiley, 1976.Google Scholar
Whitman, M. v. N. Sustaining the international economic system: Issues for U.S. policy. Essays in International Finance, No. 121. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1977.Google Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.