Stackelberg Social Equilibrium in Water Markets

Market power in water markets can be modeled as simultaneous quantity competition on a river structure and analyzed by applying social equilibrium. In an example of a duopoly water market, we argue that the lack of backward induction logic implies that the upstream supplier foregoes profitable strategic manipulation of water to the downstream supplier. To incorporate backward induction, we propose the Stackelberg social equilibrium concept. We prove the existence of Stackelberg social equilibrium in duopoly water markets with an upstream–downstream river structure and derive it in the example of a duopoly market.