FROM COLLECTIVE EVIL TO COLLECTIVE GOOD - GAMES OF TIME AND THE POSSIBILITY OF COOPERATION

It has long been perceived in political literature that it is difficult to obtain voluntary cooperation within a group of individuals with competing interests. More recently, this was demonstrated logically and described through analogy with the prisoner's dilemma, generating the theorem of the impossibility of collective action. But if variations in payoffs over time are taken into account, the strategic situation described by the prisoner's dilemma can evolve toward situations more favorable to cooperative behavior.