讲座题目：Too big to prevail: Coalition formation in the presence of a superpower

　　报告人：柯常霞

　　报告时间：2019年2月22日下午2:00-3:30

　　报告地点：经管院A208

　　主办单位：数理经济与数理金融系

　　主持人：魏立佳

　　摘要:In this study, we investigate the effect of players' power on the formation of coalitions to divide a prize. In our experimental setup with one “strong” player and three standard (“weak") players, we vary the strong player's voting rights in one dimension and manipulate the timing of agreement and communication on the prize division in the other dimension. We predict and find: First, with binding agreement, more votes translate into a higher likelihood to be in the winning coalition, independent of the strength of the strong player. Second, when binding agreement on the division of the prize is not possible at the coalition-formation stage, the strong player's likelihood to be part of the winning coalition (and her average payoff) stay high if she is not “too strong” but they both decrease significantly if her voting rights increase further. Interestingly, in contradiction to our prediction, non-binding communication at the coalition-formation stage hurts the strong player if she is too powerful. By and large, the experimental results show the importance of binding agreements for powerful players’ coalition formation capacity.

　　简介：Dr. Changxia Ke is a senior lecturer from Queensland University of Technology (QUT). Before joining QUT, she also worked at Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Finance (in Munich), and Lingnan (University) College, Sun Yat-sen University (in Guangzhou), after receiving her PhD degree in Economics from The University of Adelaide (Australia) in 2010. Her research interests have been focused on experimental and behavioural economics, in particular, the applications of microeconomic theory in areas of industrial organization and political economy. Her papers have published on high-quality international journals (such as Game and Economics Behavior, Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, and Economic Inquiry).