The coevolution of behavior and normative expectations: Customary law in the lab

Arbeitspapier

Customary law has been criticized from very different angles. Rational choice theorists claim that what looks like custom is nothing but self-interest. Positivists doubt that anything beyond consent assumes the force of law. In this paper, we adopt an experimental approach to test these claims. We show that the willingness to overcome a dilemma transcends self-interest. Cooperation is significantly higher in the presence of a meta-rule for the formation of customary law. Yet only if it is backed up by sanctions, law is significantly more effective than mere comity. Customary law guides behaviour into the normatively desired direction as normative expectations and behavioural patterns coevolve.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: Preprints of the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods ; No. 2011,32

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Public Goods ; Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement ; Design of Experiments: Laboratory, Individual ; Externalities ; Basic Areas of Law: General (Constitutional Law) ; Semiparametric and Nonparametric Methods: General
• Subject: Experiment ; Public Good ; Customary Law ; Normativity ; Crowding Out ; Gewohnheitsrecht ; Verhaltensökonomik ; Soziale Norm ; Crowding out ; Test

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Engel, Christoph ; Kurschilgen, Michael
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2011

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/57508
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:42 AM CET