ostrom's correlates of cooperation

what are the correlates of cooperation?

ostrom proposed several societal conditions that, when achieved, allow for cooperation and elimination of purely rational decision making in line with the prisoner’s dilemma.

(encourage cooperation and mitigate selfishness among actors)

accurate information at a low cost

prisoner’s dilemma defection arises when actors don’t have access to accurate information. because they cannot verify that others are cooperating or cannot tell their “win” conditions in the first place, they are more likely to defect. by having accessible, low cost, accurate information, individuals are much more likely to cooperate.

shared perception of costs and benefits of institutional change

if everyone is on the same page about the costs and benefits of major institutional changes, these changes will happen much more easily

norms of reciprocity and trust

reciprocity and trust must be established social norms that dictate that that is how individuals are expected to behave in a community. if individuals can expect that their peers will take care of them when they are in need, they are more likely to step up and help as well. trusting each other to cooperate also diminished prisoner’s dilemma style defection.

group is stable (small and well-defined with little change)

smaller group size lowers transaction costs required to manage shared resources. cooperation is built on a shared history and expectation of a common future. “newcomers” in a community may be less invested in collective outcomes because they do not share the same past with the rest of the community.

discount rate is low

individuals are future-oriented, so they are willing to sacrifice short-term benefit for long-term gain

conservative process for rule making

rules do not change on a whim constantly. this destroys trust, predictability, and expectations. there is also a high cost to constantly learning and keeping up with new rules.

accurate and low cost monitoring and sanctioning

community members must be able to easily detect rule-breaking and monitor without having to exhaust their own resources. if it was costly for them to monitor, they wouldn’t, and thus a core design principle of community management would be sacrificed