Cristina Bicchieri (2006), Cambridge University Press (print 12 December 2005, imprint 2006; online 5 June 2012; hardback ISBN 9780521574907, paperback 9780521573726) — DOI-10.1017/CBO9780511616037
Standing in the record
Filed on 2026-10-02 at the owner’s request, as part of filling out the
record’s coverage of social-ontology (ADR-017).
Unavailable because no lawful full text was reachable, so it is not read
and no NOTE is filed. What follows is the publisher’s description and
contents, and what the record’s read works say about it.
What the publisher says. The book “examines social norms, such as fairness, cooperation, and reciprocity, in an effort to understand their nature and dynamics, the expectations that they generate, and how they evolve and change”. It draws on social psychology, experimental economics and evolutionary game theory to give “an integrated account of how social norms emerge, why and when we follow them, and the situations where we are most likely to focus on relevant norms”. It examines why inefficient norms survive and how psychological dispositions can “naturally lead individuals to evolve fairness norms that closely resemble those we follow in most modern societies”.
Contents (Cambridge Core, with pages):
- Preface (ix–xiv); Acknowledgments (xv–xvi)
- 1 The Rules We Live By (1–54)
- 2 Habits of the Mind (55–99)
- 3 A Taste for Fairness (100–139)
- 4 Covenants Without Swords (140–175)
- 5 Informational Cascades and Unpopular Norms (176–213)
- 6 The Evolution of a Fairness Norm (214–234)
- References (235–244); Index (245–260)
Where the record’s readings place it.
- Hindriks & Guala (LIT-481) list it with Lewis, Sugden, Skyrms and Binmore as the equilibrium approach to institutions (n. 4). Their reply cites it, with Lewis and Sugden, for the view that the normativity of institutions comes from mutual expectations and the resentment people feel when expectations are frustrated (NOTE-395). That is their summary, not the book’s words.
- The SEP entry (LIT-487, §4.2.2) lists it among convention-based theories of social phenomena.
Topic. social-ontology first: the book’s stated subject is the
nature of social norms, which is a question about what a social fact of
that kind is. social-science holds its experimental and
game-theoretic methods. ethics holds its fairness norms.
Neighbours. Tomasello (LIT-125) explains the sense of obligation as internalised pressure from a joint “we”. This book, as its readers describe it, explains norm-following from expectations. The two are rival accounts of where social normativity comes from, and a reading should say whether the book’s account needs a “we” at all.
No instruction for machine-learning practice appears in what was seen, so nothing here points to the Anthology of the SOTA.
What a reading should check. The book’s definition of a social norm, and whether it separates empirical expectations (what others do) from normative expectations (what others think one should do); the precise conditions are not quoted here because they were not seen. How chapter 4 (Covenants Without Swords) treats cooperation without enforcement, the gap North (LIT-489) leaves open. Whether chapter 5’s informational cascades bear on how unpopular norms persist.