Prejudice, privilege, and power: Conflicts and cooperation between recognizable groups.

Cang Hui,Pietro Landi,Jeremy Bingham

doi:10.3934/mbe.2019203

Abstract

The problem of cooperation remains one of the fundamental questions in the fields of biology, sociology, and economics. The emergence and maintenance of cooperation are naturally affected by group dynamics, since individuals are likely to behave differently based on shared group membership. We here formulate a model of socio-economic power between two prejudiced groups, and explore the conditions for their cooperative coexistence under two social scenarios in a well-mixed environment. Each scenario corresponds to an asymmetrical increase in the payoffs for mutual cooperation in either cross-group or within-group interactions. In the 'inter-dependence' scenario payoffs of cross-group cooperation are enhanced, while in the 'group-cohesion' scenario payoffs of within-group cooperation are enhanced. We find that stable cooperative coexistence is possible only in the inter-dependence scenario. The conditions for such coexistence are highly sensitive to prejudice, defined as the reduction in probability for cross-group cooperation, and less sensitive to privilege, defined as the enhancements to payoffs of cross-group cooperation.

Highlights

Cooperation can be found in many contexts and at many scales, both in nature and human societies, and can occur even between species [1, 2]
We here formulate a model of socio-economic power between two prejudiced groups, and explore the conditions for their cooperative coexistence under two social scenarios in a wellmixed environment
Our model describes the prevalence of cooperation within two distinct, recognizable groups and the relative socio-economic power of the two groups

Summary

Introduction

Cooperation can be found in many contexts and at many scales, both in nature and human societies, and can occur even between species [1, 2]. The emergence and fixation of cooperation has been explained through a number of mechanisms, including kin selection [5], reciprocity [6], reputation (indirect reciprocity) [7, 8], cooperator recognition (green beards) [9], assortative encounter (direct or network-based) [10] and various forms of punishment [11, 12, 14, 15], as well as more complex network effects [16,17,18] These mechanisms, though promoting cooperation, tend to foster higher levels of cooperation between members in the same local community, family group, or language group (in the case of indirect reciprocity). Such mechanisms (or network configurations) are often associated with lower bounds on the benefit/cost ratio [19] for which cooperation can persist [22]

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion