ABSTRACT
Game theory, a study of mathematical models of conflict and cooperation between rational agents, developed into a full-fledged discipline in the mid-1920s and then got impetus in the early 1950s with the work of John Nash. In the latter half of the twentieth century, game theory found application in many fields, including biology and economics, but the use of game theoretical models has been scarce in forest economics. Since the early 1990s, game theoretic models have been used to explain selected aspects of forest economics such as people’s participation in co-management of forests, timber markets, interactions among stakeholders in the case of weak property rights and some other issues. These applications are reviewed and future directions of applications, such as applications to analyze nonmarket and multiple-stakeholder interactions, and inclusion of uncertainty, imperfect information, sequential game forms and evolutionary equilibrium concepts, are suggested.
