@article{d43d74f037e146679b9062191ee029c7,
title = "Collective commitment",
abstract = "We consider collective decisions made by agents whose preferences and power depend on past events and decisions. Faced with an inefficient equilibrium and an opportunity to commit to a policy, can the agents reach an agreement on such a policy? We provide a consistency condition linking power structures in the dynamic setting and at the commitment stage. When the condition holds, commitment has no value: any agreement that may be reached at the outset coincides with the equilibrium without commitment. When the condition fails, as in the case of time-inconsistent preferences, commitment can improve outcomes. We discuss several applications.",
author = "Christian Roessler and Sandro Shelegia and Bruno Strulovici",
note = "Funding Information: ECO 2014-59225-P). Strulovici gratefully acknowledges financial support from a National Science Foundation CAREER Award (grant 1151410) and a fellowship from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. Funding Information: This paper subsumes earlier versions entitled “The Roman Metro Problem” and “Can Commitment Resolve Political Inertia?” We are grateful to Davide Debortoli, Wiola Dziuda, Georgy Egorov, Jeff Ely, Daniel Garcia, Michael Greinecker, Karl Schlag, Stephen Schmidt, Joel Watson, and numerous seminar participants for their comments. Shelegia acknowledges financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Science and innovation (MINECO- Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2018, University of Chicago Press. All rights reserved.",
year = "2018",
month = feb,
doi = "10.1086/694294",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "126",
pages = "347--380",
journal = "Journal of Political Economy",
issn = "0022-3808",
publisher = "University of Chicago",
number = "1",
}