Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/56840 
Year of Publication: 
2012
Series/Report no.: 
Jena Economic Research Papers No. 2012,003
Publisher: 
Friedrich Schiller University Jena and Max Planck Institute of Economics, Jena
Abstract: 
The provision of public goods regularly embodies interrelated spheres of influence on multiple scales. This article examines the nature of human behavior in a multilevel social dilemma game with positive provision externalities to local and global scales. We report experimental results showing that the behavior in multilevel games is strongly driven by asymmetric conditional cooperation prioritizing local level externalities. Our findings demonstrate how individuals adjust their behavior over time to local conditions. We do not find significant adjustment to the global group average, suggesting that the local group creates a salient reference group for social comparisons in multilevel public goods provision. Our results emphasize the importance of building strong local level commitment when designing institutional responses to promote sustainable provision of globally important public goods like the global climate.
Subjects: 
experiment
groups
public good
spillover game
transboundary effects
JEL: 
H41
C72
C91
C92
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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