Trust and Corruption

Perceptions Of Fairness ◽

The One ◽

Formal Justice ◽

People’S Perceptions

Trust and trustworthiness reinforce each other, while perceptions of fairness are closely linked to trust. Corruption in the form of untrustworthy behavior, a betrayal of entrusted power, and a breach of interactional or formal justice negatively affects people’s perceptions of fairness and generalized trust. Corruption can be understood as a collective action problem, and social trust can help solve such collective action problems. Empirical studies have found considerable evidence for the reciprocal causal relationship between social trust and corruption. On the one hand, there seems to be a vicious circle of low trust, high corruption, and high inequality, thus creating an inequality trap. On the other hand, there is a virtuous circle of high trust, low corruption, and low inequality, resulting in multiple equilibria. This relationship appears to be very strong in democracies, but not in authoritarian countries.

Protecting Vulnerable Languages

Oxford Studies in Political Philosophy Volume 5 ◽

10.1093/oso/9780198841425.003.0006 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 147-170

Author(s):

Alan Patten

Keyword(s):

Collective Action ◽

The State ◽

Common Source ◽

Extensive Range ◽

The Right

This chapter explores an important but understudied argument in favor of protections for vulnerable languages. The argument observes that speakers of such languages can face a collective action problem. The question is what interventions by the state to correct such a problem would be consistent with, or even required by, a broadly liberal and egalitarian conception of justice. The chapter identifies two principles that are relevant to answering this question: the unanimity principle, which places strict limits on interventions, and the principle of correction, which licenses a more extensive range of interventions on behalf of vulnerable languages. The principles are in tension with one another but derive from a common source in liberal egalitarian thought. Overall, the right approach is to forge a compromise between the two principles, thus allowing for some interventions on behalf of vulnerable languages to protect against collective action problems.

Return to the Isle of Ted: Simulating the Collective Action Problem of Climate Change

Political Science and Politics ◽

10.1017/s1049096519002221 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 53 (3) ◽

pp. 547-555

Author(s):

Jocelyn Sage Mitchell

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Active Learning ◽

Collective Action ◽

Common Pool Resource ◽

Global Inequality ◽

Unequal Distribution ◽

Road Map ◽

The Commons

ABSTRACTThis article modifies the classic “Isle of Ted” simulation to teach students about the collective action problems associated with climate change. Modifications include the introduction of a common-pool resource (i.e., fish) and increased pirate attacks to model rising climate threats and unequal distribution of risk. A return to the Isle of Ted enables a deeper engagement with specific collective action problems of climate change, including the tragedy of the commons and issues of global inequality. This article provides a road map for the incorporation of this modified simulation into active-learning classrooms.

On the preconditions for large-scale collective action

AMBIO ◽

10.1007/s13280-019-01284-w ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 49 (7) ◽

pp. 1282-1296 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Sverker C. Jagers ◽

Niklas Harring ◽

Åsa Löfgren ◽

Martin Sjöstedt ◽

Francisco Alpizar ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Collective Action ◽

Large Scale ◽

Local Level ◽

Resource Depletion ◽

Analytical Framework ◽

Third Party ◽

Future Research ◽

Theoretical Understanding ◽

Collective Action Problems

Abstract The phenomenon of collective action and the origin of collective action problems have been extensively and systematically studied in the social sciences. Yet, while we have substantial knowledge about the factors promoting collective action at the local level, we know far less about how these insights travel to large-scale collective action problems. Such problems, however, are at the heart of humanity’s most pressing challenges, including climate change, large-scale natural resource depletion, biodiversity loss, nuclear proliferation, antibiotic resistance due to overconsumption of antibiotics, and pollution. In this paper, we suggest an analytical framework that captures the theoretical understanding of preconditions for large-scale collective action. This analytical framework aims at supporting future empirical analyses of how to cope with and overcome larger-scale collective action problems. More specifically, we (i) define and describe the main characteristics of a large-scale collective action problem and (ii) explain why voluntary and, in particular, spontaneous large-scale collective action among individual actors becomes more improbable as the collective action problem becomes larger, thus demanding interventions by an external authority (a third party) for such action to be generated. Based on this, we (iii) outline an analytical framework that illustrates the connection between third-party interventions and large-scale collective action. We conclude by suggesting avenues for future research.

An open code pledge for the neuroscience community

10.31222/osf.io/vrwm7 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Cooper Smout ◽

Dawn Liu Holford ◽

Kelly Garner ◽

ruddy manuel illanes beyuma ◽

Paula Andrea Martinez ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Collective Action ◽

Critical Mass ◽

General Purpose ◽

Research Community ◽

The Internet ◽

Evidence Based ◽

Community Project ◽

Neuroscience Community

Sharing of research code would greatly benefit neuroscience, but this practice is hampered by a collective action problem. Since the development of the internet, conditional pledge platforms (e.g., Kickstarter) have increasingly been used to solve globally-dispersed collective action problems (Hallam, 2016). However, this strategy has yet to be implemented within academia. In this brief paper, we introduce a general purpose conditional pledge platform for the research community: Project Free Our Knowledge. We highlight a new conditional pledge campaign that was initiated at Brainhack 2021 and aims to motivate a critical mass of neuroscientists to share their research code. Crucially, this commitment activates only when a user-defined threshold of support is reached. We conclude by sharing our vision for how the research community could use collective action campaigns to create a sustained, evidence-based movement for social change in academia.

Cognitive Enhancement and Network Effects: how Individual Prosperity Depends on Group Traits

Philosophia ◽

10.1007/s11406-020-00189-3 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 48 (5) ◽

pp. 1753-1768

Author(s):

Jonathan Anomaly ◽

Garett Jones

Keyword(s):

Collective Action ◽

Mate Selection ◽

Network Effects ◽

Genetic Basis ◽

Cognitive Enhancement ◽

Social Trust ◽

Embryo Selection ◽

Individual Welfare ◽

Cognitive Traits

Abstract A central debate in bioethics is whether parents should try to influence the genetic basis of their children’s traits. We argue that the case for using mate selection, embryo selection, and other interventions to enhance heritable traits like intelligence is strengthened by the fact that they seem to have positive network effects. These network effects include increased cooperation in collective action problems, which contributes to social trust and prosperity. We begin with an overview of evidence for these claims, and then argue that if individual welfare is largely a function of group traits, parents should try to preserve or enhance cognitive traits that have positive network effects.

Introduction

The Political Economy of Collective Action, Inequality, and Development ◽

10.11126/stanford/9781503604612.003.0001 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 1-10

Author(s):

William D. Ferguson

Keyword(s):

Collective Action ◽

Political Development ◽

Social Scientists ◽

Contextual Influence ◽

Human Ability ◽

The One ◽

Difficult Terrain ◽

Social Orders ◽

Political Economic

How can social scientists address the complexity of the myriad interrelations between economic development, political development, inequality, and human ability to achieve cooperative collective action across groups and populations of individuals from different backgrounds who hold widely divergent positions, interests, and perceptions? This book navigates the difficult terrain between universal-principle, one-size-fits-all frameworks, on the one hand, and approaches that insist that every society is unique, on the other. Using principles of political economy outlined in five core developmental hypotheses, as well as a method for drawing distinctions between basic types of political-economic context, this book constructs a typology that relates distributions of power to specific configurations of institutional systems and social orders. Each component of the typology points to specific types of collective-action problems that condition a society’s ability to achieve economic and political development. Policy analysis should pay attention to such contextual influence.

Corruption, Reform and the Euro

European Review ◽

10.1017/s1062798717000072 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 25 (3) ◽

pp. 423-437

Author(s):

Paul Caruana-Galizia

Keyword(s):

Collective Action ◽

Social Norms ◽

Monetary Union ◽

European Monetary Union ◽

Social Trust ◽

Institutional Quality ◽

Low Risk ◽

European Monetary ◽

Collective Action Problem

Most policymakers and academics predicted that the European monetary union would lead to economic and institutional modernizaon in its least productive members – Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain. In fact, apart from Ireland, these countries became even more corrupt and their governments even less effective. This paper suggests an explanation that links the reluctance of peripheral countries to reform with the increase in their corruption levels. It also argues that their societies were stuck in a collective action problem: individuals have understood that corruption is antithetical to institutional quality and reform, but, as they cannot trust each other to refrain from corrupt practices, they stand to lose individually from not being corrupt themselves. Monetary union was seen as an external authority that would resolve this problem. Yet weak EU and eurozone monitoring and sanctioning discouraged the formation of social norms while making it attractive for formerly non-corrupt actors to engage in corruption, given the low risk of being caught. Survey evidence supports growth in perceptions of corruption and bribery, along with the weakening of social trust, trust in the police and in politicians across the periphery after the euro’s introduction.

International Real Estate Review

International Real Estate Review ◽

10.53383/100251 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 20 (4) ◽

pp. 493-523

Author(s):

Fukuju Yamazaki ◽

◽

Taisuke Sadayuki: ◽

Keyword(s):

Collective Action ◽

Negative Impact ◽

The United States ◽

Decision Making Process ◽

Collective Decision Making ◽

Significant Cost ◽

Price Function ◽

Comparative Examination

Condominium reconstruction involves a difficult collective decision-making process among owners, which prevents older condominiums from being redeveloped efficiently. This paper aims to examine whether this type of collective action cost exists for Japanese condominiums. First, we discuss in the literature review and an empirical analysis that the number of units in a condominium complex is an appropriate proxy for the collective action problem. Then, by using the rent in the price function to control for housing characteristics, we show that the number of units has a negative impact on condominium price. Furthermore, the price function for condominiums is compared with that for single-owner rental apartments that are free from the collective action problem. The estimation results show that the number of units only negatively affects the price of condominiums and that the depreciation rate for the condominium price is greater than that for single-owner apartments. This finding is consistent with the hypothesis that a significant cost is associated with collective action problems in condominium reconstruction. Lastly, we conduct a comparative examination of condominiums in Japan and the United States, and the result suggests that revising the current Japanese condominium law could induce more efficient redevelopment of old condominiums.

Rational choice and community power structures

Power, Luck and Freedom ◽

10.7228/manchester/9781526107282.003.0004 ◽

2016 ◽

Author(s):

Keith Dowding ◽

Patrick Dunleavy ◽

Desmond King ◽

Helen Margetts

Keyword(s):

Collective Action ◽

Rational Choice ◽

Power Structure ◽

Power Structures ◽

Community Power ◽

Community Power Structures

This chapter applies Dowding’s analysis of power to the community power debate. It demonstrates the importance of the collective action problem to our understanding of power in society, showing that both pluralists and their radical critics misinterpret power in society by ignoring collective action problems. It demonstrates the nature of luck and systematic luck in the power structure.

Moral Enhancement as a Collective Action Problem

Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement ◽

10.1017/s1358246118000292 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 83 ◽

pp. 59-85

Author(s):

Walter Glannon

Keyword(s):

Collective Action ◽

Healthy Subjects ◽

Moral Enhancement ◽

Practical Reasons ◽

Individual Freedom ◽

Collective Interest ◽

Moral Behaviour ◽

The Cost

AbstractIn light of the magnitude of interpersonal harm and the risk of greater harm in the future, Ingmar Persson and Julian Savulescu have argued for pharmacological enhancement of moral behaviour. I discuss moral bioenhancement as a set of collective action problems. Psychotropic drugs or other forms of neuromodulation designed to enhance moral sensitivity would have to produce the same or similar effects in the brains of a majority of people. Also, a significant number of healthy subjects would have to participate in clinical trials testing the safety and efficacy of these drugs, which may expose them to unreasonable risk. Even if the drugs were safe and effective, a majority of people would have to co-operate in a moral enhancement programme for such a project to succeed. This goal would be thwarted if enough people opted out and decided not to enhance. To avoid this scenario, Persson and Savulescu argue that moral enhancement should be compulsory rather than voluntary. But the collective interest in harm reduction through compulsory enhancement would come at the cost of a loss of individual freedom. In general, there are many theoretical and practical reasons for scepticism about the concept and goal of moral enhancement.