The evolutionary emergence of norms

Abstract

Norms may emerge in a variety of ways: institutions may prescribe behaviours (institutional norm formation), they may be created by a social contract (voluntary norm formation) or they may gradually emerge without either bargaining or the involvement of a norm‐making institution (evolutionary norm formation). The central concern of this paper is to formulate hypotheses specifying conditions for the evolutionary emergence of norms. A process is described, starting with recurrent behaviour, leading to the development of preferences for a behaviour, and ultimately to the acceptance of norms (internalization) and the enforcement of activities. The present analysis employs the behavioural model of economics and research findings from social psychology and sociology.