ABSTRACT
Whenever three or more parties get together to jointly decide an issue of substantive interest to all of them, it is likely that at least two of them will at some point in time combine forces to their mutual advantage. When this combining of forces is deliberate, done with the full awareness of all joining parties, and binding upon the joiners, we speak of a coalition being formed. This book is about the study of coalition formation and the bargaining processes that lead to it. The approach we take to investigate this phenomenon is grounded largely in the philosophy and methodology of psychology, and in particular experimental social psychology. The theoretical orientation we adopt, however, differs from that of the majority of our social psychological colleagues, and is based on the Theory of Games. We shall examine under a common format theories of coalition formation arising from game theoretic and social scientific bases, and then compare the derived theoretical statements to data from laboratory experiments. In order to provide a context in which to embed our approach, we begin with a brief, historically oriented overview of conflict of interest and the Theory of Games. Following this historical section, we look at the relationship of social psychology and game theory, in order to establish an integrative framework and to dispel several myths that have perpetuated a disregard on the part of social psychology for game theory. Finally, in the last section of this chapter, we outline the general format that later chapters follow.
