The Use and Misuse of Coordinated Punishments*
研究在信任博弈中，代理人如何通过威胁报告委托人违规来实施敲诈，破坏合作；并探讨调查代理人努力或建立双边关系能遏制滥用、恢复合作，而调查委托人行为则无效。
Abstract Communication facilitates cooperation by ensuring that deviators are collectively punished. We explore how players might misuse communication to threaten one another, and we identify ways that organizations can deter misuse and restore cooperation. In our model, a principal plays trust games with a sequence of short-run agents who communicate with each other. An agent can shirk and then extort pay by threatening to report that the principal deviated. We show that these threats can completely undermine cooperation. Investigations of agents’ efforts, or dyadic relationships between the principal and each agent, can deter extortion and restore some cooperation. Investigations of the principal’s action, on the other hand, typically do not help. Our analysis suggests that collective punishments are vulnerable to misuse unless they are designed with an eye toward discouraging it.