Advances in the Sociology of Trust and Cooperation : Theory, Experiments, and Field Studies

Open-Access-Title The problem of cooperation is one of the core issues in sociology and social science more in general. The key question is how humans, groups, organizations, institutions, and countries can avoid or overcome the collective good dilemmas that could lead to a Hobbesian "war of all against all". The chapters in this book provide state of the art examples of research on this crucial topic. These include theoretical, laboratory, and field studies on trust and cooperation, thereby approaching the issue in three complementary and synergetic ways. The theoretical work covers articles on trust and control, reputation formation, and paradigmatic articles on the benefits and caveats of abstracting reality into models. The laboratory studies test the implications of different models of trust and reputation, such as the effects of social and institutional embeddedness and the potentially emerging inequalities this may cause. The field studies test these implications in applied settings such as business purchasing and supply, informal care, and different kinds of collaboration networks. This book is exemplary for rigorous social science. The focus is on effects of social conditions, in particular different forms of social and institutional embeddedness, on social outcomes at the macro level. Modelling efforts are applied to connect social conditions to social outcomes through micro-level behavior in ways that are easily overlooked when argumentation is intuitive and impressionistic. The book sets forth a mixed-method approach by applying different empirical methods to test hypotheses about similar questions. Several contributions re-evaluate the theoretical strengths and weaknesses following from the laboratory and field studies. Improving the theory in light of these findings facilitates pushing the boundaries of social science . The problem of cooperation and social order is one of the core issues in the social sciences. The key question is how humans, groups, institutions, and countries can avoid or overcome the collective good dilemmas that could lead to a Hobbesian "war of all against all". Using the general set of social dilemmas as a paradigmatic example, rigorous formal analysis can stimulate scientific progress in several ways. The book, consisting of original articles, provides state of the art examples of research along these lines: theoretical, experimental, and field studies on trust and cooperation. The theoretical work covers articles on trust and control, reputation formation, and paradigmatic articles on the benefits and caveats of abstracting reality into models. The experimental articles treat lab based tests of models of trust and reputation, and the effects of the social and institutional embeddedness on behavior in cooperative interactions and possibly emerging inequalities. The field studies test these models in applied settings such as cooperation between organizations, informal care, and different kinds of collaboration networks. The book will be exemplary for rigorous sociology and social sciences more in general in a variety of ways: There is a focus on effects of social conditions, in particular different forms of social and institutional embeddedness, on social outcomes. Theorizing about and testing of effects of social contexts on individual and group outcomes is one of the main aims of sociological research. Modelling efforts include formal explications of micro-macro links that are typically easily overlooked when argumentation is intuitive and impressionistic Extensive attention is paid to unintended effects of intentional behavior, another feature that is a direct consequence of formal theoretical modelling and in-depth data-analyses of the social processes. By combining different empirical methods on the same questions, essentially the book sets forth a mixed-method design across chapters, allowing for a more convincing body of evidence per underlying question Some theoretical contributions re-evaluate what has been learned from the experimental and field results about the strengths and weaknesses of the earlier theoretical propositions, and extend the theory in light of these findings Contents 1. Complementary Studies on Trust and Cooperation in Social Settings: An Introduction Part I: Theoretical Contributions 2. Institutional Design and Human Motivation: The Role of Homo Economicus Assumptions 3. Rational Choice Theory, the Model of Frame Selection and Other Dual-Process Theories. A Critical Comparison 4. Too Simple Models in Sociology: The Case of Exchange 5. Rational Exploitation of the Core by the Periphery? On the Collective (In)efficiency of Endogenous Enforcement of Universal Conditional Cooperation in a Core-Periphery Network 6. Reputation Effects, Embeddedness, and Granovetter’s Error 7. Robustness of Reputation Cascades 8. Organized Distrust: If it is there and that Effective, Why Three Recent Scandals? 9. Polarization and Radicalization in the Bounded Confidence Model: A Computer-Aided Speculation 10. Local Brokerage Positions and Access to Unique Information 11. Who Gets How Much in Which Relation? A Flexible Theory of Profit Splits in Networks and its Application to Complex Structures Part II: Experimental Tests 12. Social Identity and Social Value Orientations 13. Does Money Change Everything? Priming Experiments in Situations of Strategic Interaction 14. Social Norms and Commitments in Cooperatives – Experimental Evidence 15. Rational Choice or Framing? Two Approaches to Explain the Patterns in the Fehr-Gächter-Experiments on Cooperation and Punishment in the Contribution to Public Goods 16. Maverick: Experimentally Testing a Conjecture of the Antitrust Authorities 17. Cooperation, Reputation Effects, and Network Dynamics: Experimental Evidence 18. Comparing Consequences of Carrots and Sticks on Cooperation in Repeated Public Good Games Part III: Field Studies 19. A Sociological View on Hierarchical Failure: The Effect of Organizational Rules on Exchange Performance in Buyer- Supplier Transactions 20. Organizational Innovativeness Through Inter-Organizational Ties 21. A Transaction Cost Approach to Informal Care 22. Trust is Good – Or is Control Better? Trust and Informal Control in Dutch Neighborhoods – Their Association and Consequences 23. Religious Diversity and Social Cohesion in German Classrooms: A Micro-Macro Study Based on Empirical Simulations Notes on the Editors and Contributors The book identifies conditions for trust and cooperation. It highlights unintended consequences of individually rational behavior, and shows how trust and cooperation change dependent on social embeddedness. Such analyses inspire experimental tests in lab conditions, but also tests through empirical applications in field studies. The results of this mixed-method approach can in turn be used to inspire further theoretical work