Introduction to Game Theory ICPSR First Session, 2014

Scott Ainsworth, Instructor

sainswor@uga.edu

David Hughes, Assistant

dhughes1@uga.edu

Bryan Daves, Assistant

brdaves@verizon.net

Course Purpose and Design:

Strategic concerns underpin many social and political settings. As such, a basic

understanding of strategic choices enhances one’s understanding of social and political

settings. This course introduces many of the fundamental concepts and tools for

understanding basic game theory.

The formal analysis inherent to game theoretic methods is deductively structured and

logically based. However, no mathematical background beyond simple arithmetic is

presumed for this course. Some set theory and calculus might be introduced. Those

students with some familiarity with game theoretic tools will have a chance to refine

those tools.

The course has three goals. Our first goal is to become comfortable with the basics. Our

second goal is to understand the application of game theoretic tools to various settings.

Our third goal is to begin the development of our own applications of the tools and

techniques discussed. The careful application of formal work will be a prominent concern

throughout the course.

Key Concepts Covered in the Course Include: At the broadest level: cooperative game theory, noncooperative game theory, equilibrium

concepts associated with cooperative and noncooperative game theory

At a more refined level: imputations, the core, pure and mixed strategies, complete and

incomplete information, perfect and imperfect information, subgame perfection, beliefs

Reading Material:

The main text is Joel Watson’s Strategy: An Introduction to Game Theory, 3rd

Edition.

Other readings will be available electronically. Generally, the electronic articles apply

game theoretic tools. Our discussion of the substance will be limited and I will not vouch

for the meaningfulness of substantive applications. Instead, for the articles, we will focus

on the development of the game theoretic model.

Lecture Style:

I will use slides, but there is considerable board time.

Grading:

Grades are based on homework (@50%) and a final (@50%). Homework will be

assigned toward the middle of the week (T, W, Th). T & W homework will be due on

Friday. Th homework will be due on Monday.

For those of you new to ICPSR, the pace is intensive for students, TAs, and instructors.

Syllabus and Course Structure This course has @18 days. We will not meet on the 4

th of July. The final will be on the

last day. We are left with @17 two-hour days. This syllabus is my best estimate of what

we’ll cover and when we’ll cover it.

Day 1:

How do we understand people?

Introduction, preferences, utility

Watson Ch. 1

Recommended: Luce and Raiffa’s Games and Decisions Ch. 2, Morrow’s Game

Theory for Political Scientists Ch. 2

Days 2:

Cooperative Game Theory

How to Share a Dollar

Luce and Raiffa’s Games and Decisions Ch. 8, 9

Ordeshook’s Game Theory and Political Theory Ch. 7, 8, 9

Days 3 & 4:

Bargaining

The Nash Bargaining Solution

Watson Ch. 18

Luce and Raiffa’s Games and Decisions Ch. 6

Days 4 & 5:

Applications of Cooperative Games Weingast. 1979. “A Rational Choice Perspective on Congressional Norms.”

American Journal of Political Science 23:245-262.

Tsebelis. 1995. “Decision Making in Political Systems: Veto Players in

Presidentialism, Parliamentarism,Multicameralism and Multipartyism.”

British Journal of Political Science 25:289-325.

Days 5 & 6:

What features of a social or political situation create a game?

Extensive and Normal Form Game Forms

Watson Ch. 2, 3

Recommended: Morrow’s Game Theory for Political Scientists Ch. 3

Day 7:

Normal Form Games

Watson Ch. 4 & 5

Day 8:

Strategies and Equilibrium Concepts

Watson Ch. 6, 7 & 12

Day 9:

Strategies and Equilibrium Concepts, cont.ed

Watson Ch. 8, 9, 10 & 11

Days 10 & 11:

Simple Games to Re-introduce Preferred to Sets and Win Sets

Bonneau, Hammond, Maltzman, Wahlbeck. 2007. “Agenda Control, the Median

Justice, and the Majority Opinion on the U.S. Supreme Court.” American

Journal of Political Science 51:890-905.

An Overview of Models of Legislatures

Selections from Krehbiel. 1988. “Spatial Models of Legislative Choice.”

Legislative Studies Quarterly 13:259–319.

Days 12 & 13:

Subgame Perfection and Applications with Subgame Perfection

Watson Ch. 14 & 15

Ferejohn and Shipan. 1990. “Congressional Influence on Bureaucracy.” Journal

of Law Economics and Organization 6:1-20.

Proksch & Slapin. 2012. “Institutional Foundations of Legislative Speech.”

American Journal of Political Science 56:520-37.

Thrower, Sharece. N.d. “Presidential Action and the Supreme Court: The Case of Signing Statements.” WP. University of Pittsburgh.

Clark. 2009. “The Separation of Powers, Court Curbing, and Judicial Legitimacy.”

American Journal of Political Science 53:971-989.

Day 14:

Another look at bargaining

Watson Ch. 19

Bohnet, Frey, Huck. 2001. “More Order with Less Law: On Contract

Enforcement, Trust, and Crowding.” American Political Science Review

95:131-144.

Day 15:

Repeated Games

Axelrod. 1981. “The Emergence of Cooperation among Egoists.” American

Political Science Review 75:306-318.

Watson Ch. 22

Recommended: Selections from John Maynard Smith. Evolution and the Theory

of Games.

Day 16:

Games of Incomplete Information

Watson Ch. 24, 26 & 28

Day 17:

Introducing Signals

Appendix A in Bohnet, Frey, Huck. 2001. “More Order with Less Law: On

Contract Enforcement, Trust, and Crowding.” American Political Science

Review 95:131-144.

Schiemann. 2012. “Interrogational Torture.” Political Research Quarterly 65:3-19.

Ainsworth. 1993. “Regulating Lobbyists and Interest Group Influence.” Journal

of Politics 55:41-56.

Farrell. 1987. “Cheap Talk, Coordination, and Entry.” Rand Journal of

Economics 18:35-39.

Recommended: Cho and Kreps. 1987. “Signaling Games and Stable Equilibria.”

Quarterly Journal of Economics 102:179-221. Kreps. 1989. “Out of

Equilibrium Beliefs and Out of Equilibrium Behavior” in The Economics

of Missing Markets, Information, and Games, ed. Frank Hahn. Oxford.

Day 18:

Wrap-up and Final

By the end of this course, the following concepts and jargon will have been introduced.

backward induction, Bayes’ theorem, beliefs, Cartesian product, cheap

talk, complete information, cooperative game, core, coordination, directed

graph, dominance, dominate, edge, extensive form game, focal point,

imputation, incomplete information, information set, iterated dominance,

intuitive criterion, mapping, mixed strategy, mixed strategy equilibrium,

Nash Bargaining Solution (NBS), Nash equilibrium, nature, node

(including initial & terminal), non-cooperative game, normal form game,

pareto, perfect Bayes, player, pooling, preferred-to-sets, rationalizable,

repeated game, separating, sequential rationality, strategic form game,

strategy, subgame, subgame perfection, tree, types, utility, v-set, yolk, win

sets, zero sum

There are many very good game theory references. The following is a woefully

incomplete list of authors in alphabetical order.

Austen-Smith and Banks have a two volume set. The first volume explores the

connections between social choice theory and game theory, and the second

focuses on game theory.

Friedman is an economic historian who also studied duopoly theory and game

theory.

Fudenberg and Tirole

Kreps has an extensive micro econ text that has excellent game theory

presentations.

McCarty and Meirowitz are political scientists who wrote a game theory text that

is a notch more advanced than Watson’s. This is one of the most recent

game theory texts written for political scientists.

Myerson wrote a very nice text back in the 1990s. Subsequently, he received a

Nobel Prize for his work on mechanism design.

Osborne has several game theory texts that are commonly used. They are a notch

more advanced than Watson’s.