Paul Robinson on Cooperation, Punishment and the Criminal Justice System

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4.7 • 4.4K Ratings

🗓️ 31 August 2015

⏱️ 70 minutes

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Summary

Are human beings naturally cooperative or selfish? Can people thrive without government law? Paul Robinson of the University of Pennsylvania and author of Pirates, Prisoners and Lepers talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts the ideas in his book. Robinson argues that without government sanctions or legislation, there is an evolutionary drive to cooperate even in life-and-death situations. In such situations private punishment and norms play a crucial role in sustaining cooperative solutions. The last part of the conversation deals with the criminal justice system and how attitudes toward the system affect society-wide cooperation and crime.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:08.0	I'm your host, Russ Roberts, of Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
0:12.0	Our website is econtalk.org, where you can subscribe, comment on this podcast,
0:17.0	and find links and other information related to today's conversation.
0:21.0	We'll also find our archives where you can listen to every episode we've ever done going back to 2006.
0:27.0	Our email address is mailadycontalk.org. We'd love to hear from you.
0:34.0	Today is August 7, 2015, and my guest is Paul Robinson.
0:39.0	The Colin S. Diver Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania,
0:43.0	and the author with Sarah Robinson of pirates, prisoners, and lepers,
0:48.0	lessons from life outside the law, which is our topic for today.
0:51.0	Paul, welcome to Econ Talk.
0:53.0	Very pleased to be here.
0:55.0	Now, your book surprised me. We've had Econ Talk episodes on pirates with Pete Leason,
1:00.0	and on prisoners with Dave Scarbeck.
1:02.0	And those conversations and their books emphasize how order can emerge from the bottom up.
1:07.0	But your book, although it's related, focuses on a very different set of questions,
1:11.0	in particular, you're interested in cooperation in the absence of government law,
1:16.0	and deviations from that cooperation, and when are those likely to occur.
1:21.0	So, I think that's the start by making a rather startling point.
1:25.0	That human beings must have evolved ways to cooperate with government,
1:29.0	because after all, government appeared pretty late in human history.
1:33.0	Talk about why that's relevant.
	...

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