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Competing Norms and Social Evolution: Is the Fittest Norm Efficient?

Paul G. Mahoney
University of Virginia School of Law

Chris William Sanchirico
University of Pennsylvania Law School; University of Pennsylvania Wharton School - Business & Public Policy Department


January 2001

UVA Law School, Legal Studies Working Paper No. 00-15

Abstract:     
An influential theme in recent legal scholarship is that law is not as important as it appears. Social control, many scholars have noted, is often achieved through social norms - informal, decentralized systems of consensus and cooperation - rather than through law. This literature also displays a guarded optimism that social evolutionary processes will tend to favor the adoption of efficient norms. Using concepts from evolutionary game theory, we demonstrate that efficient norms will prevail only in certain settings and not in others: survival of the fittest does not imply survival of the efficient. In particular, we show that in many games of interest to legal scholars - games describing fundamental interactions in property, tort, and contract - evolutionary forces lead away from efficiency. We also describe how law rights the trend.

JEL Classifications: K10, K11, K12, K13

Working Paper Series

Date posted: May 26, 2000 ; Last revised: August 26, 2009

Suggested Citation

Mahoney, Paul G. and Sanchirico, Chris William, Competing Norms and Social Evolution: Is the Fittest Norm Efficient? (January 2001). UVA Law School, Legal Studies Working Paper No. 00-15. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=229694 or doi:10.2139/ssrn.229694


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Contact Information

Paul G. Mahoney (Contact Author)
University of Virginia School of Law ( email )
580 Massie Road
Charlottesville, VA 22903
United States
434-924-3996 (Phone)
434-924-7536 (Fax)

Chris William Sanchirico
University of Pennsylvania Law School ( email )
3400 Chestnut Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6204
United States
215-898-4220 (Phone)
HOME PAGE: http://www.cstone.net/~csanchir
University of Pennsylvania Wharton School - Business & Public Policy Department
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6372
United States
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