Common Knowledge and Cheap Talk in Democratic Discourse and Law

2021 ◽  
pp. 147-164
Author(s):  
Richard R. W. Brooks

This commentary illuminates key aspects of Shiffrin’s view by appeal to concrete examples and notions from game theory. It underscores the role of law as a means for the public communication of moral commitments by invoking the idea of common knowledge. Our commitments must be known to be shared, that knowledge itself must be known to be shared, and so on ad infinitum. This offers a perspective on the importance of common law from a democratic framework: common law can be seen as a mechanism for generating common knowledge about disputes and their resolution. The commentary invokes another game-theoretic notion, that of the contrast between cheap talk and costly signaling, to illuminate Shiffrin’s discussion of constitutional balancing. Where the interests of speaker and addressee are not aligned, cheap talk lacks credibility, and this is something to which courts need to be sensitive in balancing state and constitutional interests.

Author(s):  
Nick Zangwill

Abstract I give an informal presentation of the evolutionary game theoretic approach to the conventions that constitute linguistic meaning. The aim is to give a philosophical interpretation of the project, which accounts for the role of game theoretic mathematics in explaining linguistic phenomena. I articulate the main virtue of this sort of account, which is its psychological economy, and I point to the casual mechanisms that are the ground of the application of evolutionary game theory to linguistic phenomena. Lastly, I consider the objection that the account cannot explain predication, logic, and compositionality.


A discussion and analysis of the key aspects emerging during the course of the research comprise the basis of this chapter. It addresses, inter alia, the effect of the parallel importing debate on authors’ rights, the issue of publishing contracts, the idea of a “heavenly library” and copyright protection on the Internet, including a discussion on how existing territorial copyright structures may be affected by electronic publishing. This chapter also considers the Google initiatives and possible new business models for authors. The emerging theme of resale royalties for authors is examined and compared with the Resale Royalty Right for Visual Artists Act 2009. In conclusion, observations are made on the role of the author in the changing publishing landscape, situating the author as member of the “author sphere” in the context of the public sphere.


Author(s):  
Christian B. Jacobsen ◽  
Eva Knies

The central issue in this chapter is people management in public organizations. That is, managers’ implementation of HR practices and their leadership behavior in supporting the employees they supervise at work. This chapter focuses on five key aspects related to HRM and leadership in a public sector context. First, the historical move from personnel management to HRM and leadership. Second, the distinction between external and internal management and this chapter’s focus on internal management. Third, the role of middle and frontline leaders in the implementation of policies and their responsibility for turning general policies into results. Fourth, the mutual dependency between HRM policies and leadership. Fifth, the distinction between intended, implemented, and perceived HRM and leadership. This chapter systematically draws on both the general HRM and leadership bodies of literature, and specifies these insights to the public sector context whenever possible.


Author(s):  
Lisa Waddington

This chapter explores the relationship between disability quota schemes and non-discrimination law in Europe. While at first sight they seem to sit uneasily beside each other, the chapter reveals how, in some instances, quota schemes can serve to facilitate compliance with non-discrimination legislation. At the same time, the chapter explores seeming incompatibilities between the two approaches and considers whether there are differences between common and civil law jurisdictions in this respect. Tentative conclusions suggest that there is a greater willingness to establish quota schemes through legislation in civil law jurisdictions compared to common law jurisdictions, and that quota schemes in civil law jurisdictions are more likely to provide for the imposition of a levy in the case that employers fail to meet their quota obligations through employing the required number of people with disabilities. There also seems to be some indication that there is greater awareness of the potential for conflict or tension, in various forms, between non-discrimination law and quota schemes in common law jurisdictions than in civil law jurisdictions. Finally, the two schemes operating in the common law states are only applicable to the public sector—whilst in civil law states quotas are generally applied to both public and private sector employers. This may indicate different perceptions regarding the role of public sector employers and the legitimacy of imposing quota requirements.


2021 ◽  
pp. 3-25
Author(s):  
David Ormerod ◽  
Karl Laird

It is neither easy to define crime nor identify the aims of criminal law but some characteristics may be universal to every crime, including that it involves public wrongs and moral wrongs. ‘Public wrongs’ reflect the important role of the public in punishing crimes. A crime incorporating a moral wrong implies that a ‘wrong’ is done or harm to others is involved but experience suggests that morality and criminal law are not coextensive. The chapter introduces students to thinking about criminalization and the need to guard against overcriminalization. It also examines the principal sources of criminal law: common law, statute, EU law, international law and the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). Problematically, important and serious offences and most defences in English law derive from common law rather than statute, and some offences—from public nuisance to gross negligence manslaughter—have been challenged recently on grounds of certainty and retrospectivity.


1997 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ramy Elitzur ◽  
Anthony Wensley

In recent years, game theory has provided valuable insights into many different types of organizational arrangements. In this paper we investigate some of the ways in which game theory can help us to understand the structure and function of information systems outsourcing arrangements. We provide a brief review of two-person non-cooperative game theory. We discuss the basic concepts of dominance and Nash equilibria. In particular we stress the importance of the information structure of two-person games. We then provide a general game-theoretic interpretation of many key aspects of information systems outsourcing arrangements. In particular, we investigate the rationales behind many of the different ways of determining fees and the effects of the transfer of assets between the outsourcing company and the outsourcing vendor. Finally, we discuss how one particular type of non-cooperative two-person game might be useful as a model of information systems outsourcing arrangements. This model, the principal-agent model, has been extensively studied and in the hands of the authors has provided some initial insights into information systems outsourcing arrangements.


Author(s):  
Katalin Ligeti

This chapter focuses on the place of the public prosecutor in common law and civil law jurisdictions. It first describes the institutional positioning of public prosecutors, particularly vis-à-vis the executive power, before discussing their role and powers in regard to the pretrial phase. It then considers the increasing tendency to entrust the public prosecutor with quasi-judicial sanctioning powers in the context of out-of-court procedures (“prosecutorial adjudication”). It also examines the role of specialized law enforcement authorities in the exercise of investigative and prosecutorial functions, coercive measures and the need for judicial authorization, and prosecutorial discretion and alternatives to trial proceedings. Finally, it explains how independence, centralization and decentralization, legality and opportunity of prosecution, and the alternatives to trial proceedings have been translated to the supranational design of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO).


2011 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 109-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
William H Dutton

Research on information technology has been focused primarily on the worlds of IT and management systems for business and government to the relative neglect of research on the digital and institutional infrastructures that underpin the research enterprise itself. When digital research is studied, the emphasis has been on the diffusion of technological innovations, rather than the social and political dynamics shaping the design and role of technologies in research. However, what researchers know, and with whom they collaborate, could be transformed through the strategic use of advances designed to support research, defined here as ‘research-centred computational networks’. This article presents a framework for conceptualizing the social and technological choices shaping the next generation of research in ways that could open – democratize – key aspects of the research process that move well beyond academic publication. The framework highlights the limited scope of innovation to date, and identifies a variety of factors that maintain and enhance institutional control over the research process, at the risk of losing the creative and productive bottom-up participation by networked researchers and citizen researchers among the public at large. Conceptualizing, prioritizing and advancing study of next generation research is one of the most significant but difficult challenges facing scholars of information technology.


2016 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 131-150 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vincent P. Crawford

In this paper, I discuss the state of progress in applications of game theory in economics and try to identify possible future developments that are likely to yield further progress. To keep the topic manageable, I focus on a canonical economic problem that is inherently game-theoretic, that of fostering efficient coordination and cooperation in relationships, with particular attention to the role of communication. I begin with an overview of noncooperative game theory's principal model of behavior, Nash equilibrium. I next discuss the alternative “thinking” and “learning” rationales for how real-world actors might reach equilibrium decisions. I then review how Nash equilibrium has been used to model coordination, communication, and cooperation in relationships, and discuss possible developments


2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (s1) ◽  
pp. 125-164
Author(s):  
Dat Thanh Nguyen ◽  
Viet Anh Hoang

AbstractThis paper maps Leeper and Walker (2011) model into a game theory framework to study about the strategic aspects of monetary and fiscal interaction under a fiscal stress caused by an ageing population problem. The paper reveals that the outcomes of the game depend on the parameters of the underlying model, the size of the projected transfers and the public inflation expectation. The findings show that commitment to the target (inflation, government transfers) plays a crucial role in the policy interaction.


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