The Stability of Exchange Networks
Date
01.01.2007
01.01.2007
Authors
Gönül Doðan, M. A.L.M. van Assen, Arnout van de Rijt, Vincent Buskens
JEL Code
D85
D85
Keywords:
Exchange Networks,Stability,Efficiency,Equity,Social Dilemma
Exchange Networks,Stability,Efficiency,Equity,Social Dilemma
Publisher
Climate Change and Sustainable Development
Climate Change and Sustainable Development
Editor
Carlo Carraro
Carlo Carraro
This paper develops a formal model of exchange network stability that combines expected value theory (Friedkin 1995) with the economic literature on network dynamics. We identify stable networks up to size 8 for varying costs and investigate whether they are Pareto efficient and egalitarian. Only a very small number of networks are stable. Odd cycles and networks consisting of dyads and at most one isolate are the only egalitarian, efficient, and stable networks for a large cost range. We show that some of these results are generalizable to networks of any size and are independent of using expected value theory.