Cooperation, norms, and conflict

Cooperation is of utmost importance to society as a whole, but is often challenged by individual self-interests. While game theory has studied this problem extensively, there is little work on interactions within and across groups with different preferences or beliefs. Yet, people from different social or cultural backgrounds often meet and interact. This can imply conflict, since behavior that is considered cooperative by one population might be perceived as non-cooperative from the viewpoint of another. To understand the dynamics and outcome of the competitive interactions between and within groups, we study game-dynamical equations for multiple populations with conflicting interests and different power. They allow us to address important questions: For example, can cooperation in the prisoner\'s dilemma be promoted by different group preferences? Under what conditions can costly punishment, or other mechanisms, foster the evolution of norms? And when does cooperation fail, leading to antagonistic behavior, protest, or conflict? Our exhaustive quantitative analysis reveals a large variety of interesting and, at times, even paradoxical results, relevant for society, law, and economics. The unified game-theoretical approach also offers insights why the evolution of language and culture may have shown such an amazingly fast pace.

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