Resumen de An Evolutionary Game Approach to Fundamentalism and Conflict

Danial G. Arce, Todd Sandler

• This paper investigates the evolutionary equilibria of a clash of cultures game where conflict results from failures to share social power in individual pairings.

  The model is based on a adaptation of Skyrm�s [1996] analysis of the evolution of social justice within the ultimatum game. Members of a general population are matched with those of a fundamentalist population, the latter being more cohesive and insistent that its identity traits define the norms for, and outcomes of, social, economic, and political interaction.

  The underlying replicator dynamics are found to be a function of in the initial extent of moderate behavior within the general population, and the level of cohesion and intolerance within the fundamentalist population. Simulations of the replicator dynamics reveal a tradeoff between the intolerance of fundamentalism and the likelihood of a takeover. This tradeoff is reversed if fundamentalism is falsifiable: affording non-fundamentalists the ability to signal fundamentalist traits produces a bandwagon effect.