EQUIVARIANT GENERAL-EQUILIBRIUM-THEORY

The main purpose of this paper is to investigate the properties of a version of the general equilibrium model where symmetry considerations are explicitely taken into account. This version, called the equivariant model, is shown to be a natural framework to study sunspot equilibria. The problem of sunspot equilibria can then be viewed as one of symmetry breaking. Existence of asymmetric or sunspot equilibria is addressed through the dual approach of price-income equilibrium analysis that splits the problem of breaking symmetries into two separate easier problems. © 1990.