Governance Reimagined by David R. Koenig

Author:David R. Koenig
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wiley
Published: 2012-03-26T16:00:00+00:00

If Only You'd Cooperate

Efficient cooperation requires trust. We know that cooperation among agents is required for things of net value to emerge from complex systems. Cooperation, as a strategy, was the first move made by the “tit-for-tat” program, which won the original iterative Prisoners’ Dilemma tournament. And, the program that ultimately beat the tit-for-tat program in a subsequent tournament found a way to cooperate with other “friendly” programs once it established that it knew them. In other words, cooperation happened once trust had been established between two independent agents (computer programs) that were able to communicate with each other.

An amazing story from World War I helps illustrate how cooperation can emerge even in the most unlikely circumstances. During extended trench warfare, frontline soldiers were known to refrain from trying to kill the enemy during certain times of the day, allowing them to conduct “private business.”2 As long as their restraint was reciprocated by the other side, the place and time of this temporary truce was respected by all.3 Warring soldiers, who otherwise were ordered to kill each other, developed cooperation because trust was established and reenforced with each successful venture to the safe zone. Further, the battle had no predetermined end time, so there was no benefit received from noncooperation.

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