Game Forms, Rights, and the Efficiency of Social Outcomes

Abstract

We consider Sen's familiar paradox of the Paretian liberal in a framework where individual rights are represented as a game form. We distinguish the different senses in which one can think of the problem of an inconsistency between the Pareto criterion and the existence of individual rights. Conditions, in terms of properties of the relevant game form, are given for such inconsistency to arise under different notions of game theoretic equilibria.Journal of Economic LiteratureClassification Number: D71.