Normative Conflict and Cooperation in Sequential Social Dilemmas

Abstract

This paper shows how conflicting normative views of fair contribution rules can be used to design sequential contribution mechanisms to foster human cooperation in heterogeneous populations. Our model predicts that a sequential mechanism which solicits contributions first from wealthy actors generates greater public good provision and narrows wealth inequality more than any alternative sequential mechanism. Our experimental data show that the mechanism with rich first-movers generates greater contributions than alternative mechanisms, as predicted. Results suggest how altering the sequential order of contributions may affect public good provision and help organizations to increase the total value of solicited contributions.