In this paper we view bargaining and cooperation as an interaction superimposed on a game in strategic form. A multistage bargaining procedure for N players, the “proposer commitment” procedure, is presented. It is inspired by Nash’s two-player variable-threat model; a key feature is the commitment to “threats.” We establish links to classical cooperative game theory solutions, such as the Shap...

This paper is concerned with the question of extending the definition of the bargaining set, a cooperative game solution, when cooperation takes place in a repeated setting. The focus is on situations in which the players face (finite or infinite) sequences of exogenously specified TU-games and receive sequences of imputations against those static cooperative games in each time period. Two alte...

Two agents bargain over the allocation of a bundle of divisible commodities. After strategically reporting utility functions to a neutral arbitrator, the outcome is decided by using a bargaining solution concept chosen from a family that includes the Nash and the Raiffa-Kalai-Smorodinsky solutions. When reports are restricted to be continuous, strictly increasing and concave, it has been shown ...

It is known that a player in a noncooperative game can benefit by publicly restricting their possible moves before play begins. We show that, more generally, a player may benefit by publicly committing to pay an external party an amount that is contingent on the game’s outcome. We explore what happens when external parties – who we call “game miners” – discover this fact and seek to profit from...

This paper is concerned with the question of defining the bargaining set, a cooperative game solution, when cooperation takes place in a dynamic setting. The focus is on dynamic cooperative games in which the players face (finite or infinite) sequences of exogenously specified TU-games and receive sequences of imputations against those static cooperative games in each time period. Two alternati...

Most literature on the hold–up problem assumes that ex post bargaining outcomes are insensitive to prior investment costs. However, many bargaining procedures admit multiple equilibria and hence allow investment costs to affect bargaining outcomes. On the other hand, multiplicity of equilibria leaves scope for coordination failure. We report on three experiments in which unilateral investment i...

Autonomous agents with negotiation competence are becoming increasingly important and pervasive. This paper follows an interdisciplinary approach to build autonomous negotiating agents by considering both game-theoretic techniques and bargaining procedures from the social sciences. The paper presents a generic model that handles bilateral multi-issue negotiation, describes equilibrium strategie...

We compare Gamson’s Law, a popular empirical model of legislative bargaining, with two non-cooperative bargaining models in three player divide the dollar games in which no player has enough votes to form a winning coalition on their own. Both of the game theoretic models better organize the comparative static data resulting from changes in nominal bargaining power than does Gamson’s Law. We al...

We show that a bargaining game of alternating offers with exogenous risk of breakdown and played by dynamically consistent non-expected utility maximizers is formally equivalent to Rubinstein’s (1982) game with time preference. Within this game, the behavior of dynamically consistent players is indistinguishable from the behavior of expected utility maximizers. Journal of Economic Literature Cl...

The ultimatum bargaining game (UBG), a widely used method in experimental economics, clearly demonstrates that motives other than pure monetary reward play a role in human economic decision making. In this study, we explore the behaviour and physiological reactions of both responders and proposers in an ultimatum bargaining game using heart rate variability (HRV), a small and nonintrusive techn...