Punishment Despite Reasonable Doubt—A Public Goods Experiment with Sanctions Under Uncertainty
Kristoffel Grechenig, Andreas Nicklisch & Christian Thöni
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versione breve
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Under a great variety of legally relevant circumstances, people have
to decide whether or not to cooperate when they face an incentive to
defect. The law sometimes provides people with sanctioning
mechanisms to enforce pro-social behavior. Experimental evidence on
voluntary public goods provision shows that the option to punish
others substantially improves cooperation, even if punishment is
costly. However, these studies focus on situations where there is no
uncertainty about the behavior of others. We investigate sanctions
in a world with “reasonable doubt” about the
contributions of others. Interestingly, people reveal a high
willingness to punish even if their information about cooperation
rates is highly inaccurate. If there is some nontrivial degree of
noise, punishment (1) cannot establish cooperation high and (2)
reduces welfare even below the level of a setting without
punishment. Our findings suggest that sufficient information
accuracy about others’ behavior is crucial for the efficiency
of sanction mechanisms. If a situation is characterized by low
information accuracy, precluding sanctions, for example, through
high standards of proof, is likely to be optimal
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tipo
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Journal paper
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parole chiave
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lingua
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English
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kind of paper
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journal article
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data di apparenza
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12-2010
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giornale
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Journal of Empirical Legal Studies
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Editore
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Wiley-Blackwell (Oxford)
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ISSN
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1740-1453
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edizione del giornale
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7
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numero del giornale
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4
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pagine
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847-867
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review
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double-blind review
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citation
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Grechenig, K., Nicklisch, A., & Thöni, C. (2010). Punishment
Despite Reasonable Doubt—A Public Goods Experiment with Sanctions
Under Uncertainty. Journal of Empirical Legal Studies, 7(4),
847-867.
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