Egoistic micro-motivation can sustain cooperation via self-interest without any general cooperative disposition.

Evidence

An egoistic micro-motivation, lastly, is fairly self-explanatory: I have such a motivation to cooperate when, in those circumstances, I see it as in my egoistic interest to do so, but this is not because I am generally motivated, as in the Hobbesian system, to cooperate as such. This does not rule out the possibility that I may regularly find myself in such situations, or even that there may be some structure as a result of which I regularly find myself in such situations: to produce such a structure might be a triumph of the Invisible Hand. It will be a mark of this kind of motivation, however, in a pure form, that there will be no motivational momentum from one case of cooperation to the next. I may readily cooperate with X the next time, because I readily believe that it will suit my interest to cooperate with X next time, but there is no general disposition to cooperate, or even to cooperate with X, as such, and if the particular features of a given occasion do not make it in my interest to cooperate, I shall not do so. — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 199

Categorization

• DEFINE: Precisely defines egoistic micro-motivation as distinct from the Hobbesian macro-motivation, distinguishing it by the absence of motivational momentum.
• XREF: Defines the structural mechanism by which trust can emerge from self-interest without generalized dispositions — the exact distinction Hardin’s observable-constraints account depends on. — connects to: Rational calculation alone would generate status seeking regardless of innate drive — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 63; Individual self-interest can produce collective flourishing without intention — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom,…, 467