Simpson, B;
Aksoy, O;
(2017)
Cumulative advantage in collective action groups: How competition for group members alters the provision of public goods.
Social Science Research
, 66
pp. 1-21.
10.1016/j.ssresearch.2017.03.001.
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Abstract
Research on collective action problems and the provision of public goods has yielded an array of important insights into why people sacrifice for their groups, but ignores the processes that bring people into those groups in the first place. The literature is also silent on the fact that groups providing similar public goods often compete with one another to attract new members. We extend the reach of theories of collective action problems to bring them to bear on these interrelated issues. Results from four experiments support our predictions about when group members compete to attract new adherents by sacrificing more for group goals. Further, we find that prospective members join more productive groups at much higher rates and then contribute to them at high levels. These processes give way to cumulative advantage, whereby initially productive groups continually attract new members. Thus competition for members can yield large inequalities in the size and success of collective action groups.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Cumulative advantage in collective action groups: How competition for group members alters the provision of public goods |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2017.03.001 |
| Publisher version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2017.03.001 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This manuscript version is published under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial Non-derivative 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). This licence allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the work for personal and non-commercial use providing author and publisher attribution is clearly stated. Further details about CC BY licences are available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0. Access may be initially restricted by the publisher. |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education > IOE - Social Research Institute |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1544256 |
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