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Zusatztext " Meeting at Grand Central would make a great text for an advanced undergraduate or graduate course on cooperation in anthropology, economics, sociology, or political science. There is something for everybody in this challenging and enlightening read." ---James L. Boone, Journal of Anthropological Research Informationen zum Autor Lee Cronk is professor of anthropology at Rutgers University. He is the author of That Complex Whole: Culture and the Evolution of Human Behavior . Beth L. Leech is associate professor of political science at Rutgers University. She is the coauthor of Basic Interests: The Importance of Groups in Politics and in Political Science (Princeton). Klappentext Begins with a look at the ideas of Mancur Olson and George Williams! who shifted the question of why cooperation happens from an emphasis on group benefits to individual costs. This book then explores how these ideas have influenced our thinking about cooperation! coordination! and collective action. Zusammenfassung A revolutionary approach to the study of cooperation that unites evolutionary biology and the social sciences From the family to the workplace to the marketplace, every facet of our lives is shaped by cooperative interactions. Yet everywhere we look, we are confronted by proof of how difficult cooperation can be—snarled traffic, polarized politics, overexploited resources, social problems that go ignored. The benefits to oneself of a free ride on the efforts of others mean that collective goals often are not met. But compared to most other species, people actually cooperate a great deal. Why is this? Meeting at Grand Central brings together insights from evolutionary biology, political science, economics, anthropology, and other fields to explain how the interactions between our evolved selves and the institutional structures we have created make cooperation possible. The book begins with a look at the ideas of Mancur Olson and George Williams, who shifted the question of why cooperation happens from an emphasis on group benefits to individual costs. It then explores how these ideas have influenced our thinking about cooperation, coordination, and collective action. The book persuasively argues that cooperation and its failures are best explained by evolutionary and social theories working together. Selection sometimes favors cooperative tendencies, while institutions, norms, and incentives encourage and make possible actual cooperation. Meeting at Grand Central will inspire researchers from different disciplines and intellectual traditions to share ideas and advance our understanding of cooperative behavior in a world that is more complex than ever before. Inhaltsverzeichnis Preface ix Chapter 1 Cooperation! Coordination! and Collective Action 1 Box 1.1 Experimental Economic Games 15 Chapter 2 Adaptation: A Special and Onerous Concept 18 Chapter 3 The Logic of Logic! and Beyond 47 Box 3.1 Types of Groups 49 Box 3.2 Types of Goods 53 Chapter 4 Cooperation and the Individual 72 Box 4.1 The Reciprocity Bandwagon 75 Box 4.2 The Prisoner's Dilemma Game 79 Chapter 5 Cooperation and Organizations 101 Chapter 6 Meeting at Penn Station: Coordination Problems and Cooperation 124 Box 6.1 Coordination Games 150 Chapter 7 Cooperation Emergent 151 Chapter 8 Meeting at Grand Central 169 Notes 189 References 207 Index 23 ...
