Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/56189 
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2008
Series/Report no.: 
SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Economics and Finance No. 707
Publisher: 
Stockholm School of Economics, The Economic Research Institute (EFI), Stockholm
Abstract: 
In line with the widely applied principle of just deserts, we assume that the severity of the penalty on a contract offender increases in the harm on the other. When this principle holds, the influence of the efficiency of the agreement on the incentives to abide by it crucially depends on whether actions are strategic complements or substitutes. With strategic substitutes, there is a conflict between Pareto-efficiency and the incentives to abide. The opposite tends to be true when actions are strategic complements. The results are interpreted in the context of legal contracts and in that of informal mutual promises.
Subjects: 
partnerships
contracts
pre-play communication
legal enforcement
social norms
guilt
JEL: 
C72
C78
K12
Z13
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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