Conflict settings share common-interest structures across wildly different scales

Evidence

This is a series of closely interrelated essays in a field that is variously described as “theory of bargaining,” “theory of conflict,” or “theory of strategy.” Strictly speaking, the subject falls within the theory of games, but within the part of game theory in which the least satisfactory progress has been made, the situations in which there is common interest as well as conflict between adversaries: negotiations, war and threats of war, criminal deterrence, tacit bargaining, extortion. The philosophy of the book is that in the strategy of conflict there are enlightening similarities between, say, maneuvering in limited war and jockeying in a traffic jam, between deterring the Russians and deterring one’s own children, or between the modern balance of terror and the ancient institution of hostages. — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 7

Categorization

• XREF: Directly aligns with the reader’s framing of Gambetta’s private protection markets and Milgrom’s private judges — Schelling’s whole premise is that deterrence, extortion, and tacit bargaining share one structure across domains. — connects to: Most conflicts are variable-sum games with common interests — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 20; Conflict and partnership-distrust situations share one identical game structure — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 463; Adversaries in indeterminate games mutually construct the norms that govern their conflict — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 379 (+1 more)

Related

• Most conflicts are variable-sum games with common interests (similarity 0.86)
• Conflict situations are essentially bargaining situations (similarity 0.84)
• Even conflict between adversaries can be modeled as partnership discipline (similarity 0.82)
• Game theory succeeds on pure conflict but fails on mixed conflict-cooperation (similarity 0.82)
• Formal game theory abstracted away the communication and enforcement systems it needs (similarity 0.81)
• Deterrence requires mixed conflict and common interest between parties (similarity 0.80)
• Conflict and partnership-distrust situations share one identical game structure (similarity 0.80)
• Game theory clarifies deterrence problems but remains too abstract to apply directly (similarity 0.80)
• The bargaining solution’s appeal derives from its focal quality, not its formal derivation (similarity 0.79)
• Nuclear arms negotiations are an open-ended bargaining problem beyond fixed payoff matrices (similarity 0.79)
• Tacit-bargaining theory guides where to seek terms, not their probability (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Most conflicts are variable-sum games with common interests #expands (0.85) — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 20
• Identical interaction forms recur across radically different social groups #corroborates (0.85) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 198
• Conflict and partnership-distrust situations share one identical game structure #corroborates (0.80) — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 463
• Adversaries in indeterminate games mutually construct the norms that govern their conflict #expands (0.75) — Thomas C. Schelling, The Strategy of Conflict, 379