Information-sensitive Leviathans – the emergence of centralized punishment
Recent studies emphasize the importance of centralized sanctions (pool- punishment) for well-functioning human cooperation. We show that the relative success of centralized sanctioning institutions crucially depends on the information environment and on the use of antisocial punishment. While central institutions do not outperform decentralized sanctions under perfect information, central institutions which make little use of antisocial punishment attract large parts of the population in an imperfect information environment. Our results are in line with anthropological and historical studies that refer to the centralization of sanctions as a recent phenomenon for which the information-complexity of the environment and (self-) restraints of the central authority to prevent anti-social punishment played a crucial role.
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