Standard incentive theory models provide a rich framework for studying informational problems but assume that contracts can be perfectly enforced. This paper studies the design of self-enforced relational contracts. I show that optimal contracts often can take a simple stationary form, but that self-enforcement restricts promised compensation and affects incentive provision. With hidden informa...

We develop a model of nonstationary relational contracts in order to study internal wage dynamics. Workers are heterogenous and each workers’ ability is both private information and fixed for all time. Learning therefore occurs within employment relationships. The inferences, however, are confounded by moral hazard: the distribution of output is determined by both the worker’s type and by his u...

This paper tests the robustness of the “two-tiered labor market” in which efficient bilateral contracts emerge between firms and workers (Brown, Falk and Fehr, 2004). Our experiment introduces stochastic interruptions in firm’s ability to offer contracts. Involuntarily laid off workers are eager to be reemployed; they are unselective about job offers and do not shirk. Firm’s preference for thes...

Relational exchange arrangements supported by trust are commonly viewed as substitutes for complex contracts in interorganizational exchanges. Many argue that formal contracts actually undermine trust and thereby encourage the opportunistic behavior they are designed to discourage. In this paper, we develop and test an alternative perspective: that formal contracts and relational governance fun...

Economic performance depends crucially on how parties adapt to changing circumstances. We therefore study how the organization of economic activity can facilitate such adaptation. Where spot transactions would produce inefficient adaptation, we ask how governance structures (allocations of control) can facilitate relational contracts that improve on spot adaptation. We show that the optimal gov...

In this paper, the interacting effect of formal contracts and relational governance on vendor profitability and quality in the software outsourcing industry are examined. We focus on a critical manifestation of relational governance—the presence of relational flexibility in the exchange relationship—and argue that the enacted observation of relational flexibility is driven by perceptions of exc...