@TechReport{iza:izadps:dp8866, author={Nyborg, Karine}, title={Reciprocal Climate Negotiators}, year={2015}, month={Feb}, institution={Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)}, address={Bonn}, type={IZA Discussion Paper}, number={8866}, url={https://www.iza.org/index.php/publications/dp8866}, abstract={International climate negotiations have been troubled by mutual mistrust. At the same time, a hope seems to prevail that once enough countries moved forward, others would follow suit. If the abatement game faced by climate negotiators is a Prisoners' Dilemma, and countries are narrowly self-interested, such a hope seems unfounded. However, if countries display reciprocity – a preference to repay meanness by meanness and kindness by kindness – their willingness to abate will be conditional on others' abatement. I show that a full or majority coalition can be stable. This requires, however, that a majority of countries have relatively strong reciprocity preferences. No coalition participation is always stable. In addition, a stable minority coalition may exist; if so, it is weakly larger than the maximum stable coalition with standard preferences, but is characterized by mutually negative sentiments.}, keywords={international environmental agreements;reciprocity;coalitions}, }