Milan-Bicocca. He is the author of Civil Happiness, also published by

Routledge.

1. Game Theory and Economic Analysis

A quiet revolution in economics

Christian Schmidt

2. Negotiation Games

Applying game theory by bargaining and arbitration

Steven J. Brams

3. The Topology of the 2 × 2 Games

A new periodic table

David Robinson and David Goforth

4. Reciprocity, Altruism and the Civil Society

In praise of heterogeneity

Luigino Bruni

Contents

Acknowledgements viii

Introduction ix

1 The current debate on economics and reciprocity 1

2 Homo oeconomicus’ two hundred years of solitude 13

3 A first form of reciprocity: cooperation without benevolence 27

4 Reciprocity as philía 38

5 Unconditional reciprocity 46

6 Dynamics of reciprocity in a heterogeneous world 59

7 Three is better than two 68

8 In praise of heterogeneity 79

9 Reciprocity is one, but reciprocities are many 86

Appendices 98

Notes 124

Bibliography 149

Index 155

Acknowledgements

This book not only speaks about reciprocity, but also has been an experience

of reciprocity – as many books usually are. Reciprocity with many scholars,

colleagues, friends and also with people met for a few moments in a train or in

a congress, or maybe listened on the radio. Then it is impossible to thank

everyone. Some of them, however, have had a direct role in the preparation of

the work.

First of all a special thank to Alessandra Smerilli, a young economist with

a special gift for the mathematical and formal reasoning, who has been fundamental

for the technical chapters and, especially, for the Appendix. She is

an actual co-author of some key analytical passages of the book.

I would thank Benedetto Gui, with whom I have discussed at length

the entire book. The discussions with Bob Sudgen and Stefano Zamagni,

especially for their criticisms (that only in part I have been able to endorse),

have been precious moments of verification of the controversial methodological

choices performed in this volume.

Thanks also to Leo Andringa, Angelo Antoci, Nicolò Bellanca, Sergio

Beraldo, Luca Crivelli, Pierpaolo Donati, Mario Gilli, Shaun Hargreaves-

Heap, Lorna Gold, Alessandra Malini, Salvatore Natoli, Vittorio Pelligra,

Pier Luigi Porta, Luca Stanca, Nicholas J. Theocarakis, Giuseppe Maria

Zanghì and Luca Zarri.

Finally, I would like to say thank you to the colleagues of the Dipartimento

di Economia Politica of my University (Milano-Bicocca), the members of the

‘Scuola Abbà’ (Rome) and the actors of the Economy of Communion project

of the Focolare Movement where I find most of the vital inspirations for

my work.

A first version of this book has been published in Italian, Reciprocità.

Dinamiche di cooperazione, economia e società civile, 2006, by Bruno

Mondadori, Milan. I thank the chief executive, Dr. Sandro D’Alessandro, for

the permission of translation.

The translation into English has been made by Valeria Jacovelli who did

her work with an exceptional care and competence: my final warm thanks is

for her.

Introduction

To feel much for others and little for ourselves . . . constitutes the perfection of

human nature . . . As to love our neighbour as we love ourselves is the great

law of Christianity, so it is the great precept of nature to love ourselves only as

we love our neighbour.

Adam Smith

Civil life is essentially a matter of reciprocity. Cooperation, friendship, contracts,

pacts, family, love and even conflict, all are relationships very different

from one another, but sharing basically one characteristic: all are forms of

reciprocity. The multidimensional nature of reciprocity is the idea that has

inspired this book: reciprocity is, at the same time, one and many; civil society

flourishes if and when the different forms of reciprocity are seen as complementary

instead of competitive or substitute one another.

In the following pages I shall look at reciprocity with a broad glance:

linking my reasoning to that of Aristotle and Genovesi (among the few companions

I met along the way), with reciprocity I mean the ‘bond of society’.

This bond is by nature plural, nevertheless its various expressions are joined

with giving-and-receiving, taking-and-giving, going-and-returning, i.e. a

mutual interpersonal structure.

Aristotle, for example, uses the expression antipeponthos 1 (α´ ντιπεπονθ

)

in order to express both commercial and civil relationships, because in all

relations of the polis (πολι ) exists an idea of proportionality and mutuality.2

Similar is the Latin etymology of the word. Reciprocal comes from reciprocus

or reciprocitate, which means ‘returning the same way, alternating’, reciprocus,

where reci is from recus (from re- ‘back’ + -cus, adjective formation),

and procus (from pro- ‘forward’ + -cus, adjective formation).3 An Etymological

dictionary translates reciprocity as ‘retrogression, alternation, ebb’ or ‘move

back and forth’.4

Starting from these ancient etymologies, I have tried to overcome the

contraposition – that characterizes the modern debate in social sciences –

among principles, i.e. reciprocity vs market relations, or gift vs contract, a

contraposition strictly linked to others, and more fundamental, between

market and civil society, community and society.

Most of the modern social theories (from Tönnies to Boltanski), in fact,

have been built upon the theory of the separation of principles, according to

which the market logic ends when that of reciprocity begins (and vice versa),

and when one principle (market) advances the other (gift) retreats. According

to Serge-Christophe Kolm (2006, p. 25), an affluent author in the studies on

reciprocity, for example, ‘[a] gift or favour motivated by another gift, [. . .],

constitutes the very important social relation of reciprocity. This is very different

from a self-interested exchange where each transfer (or favour) is provided

under the condition that the other is provided, and hence is not a gift

(in the proper sense of the term)’.

This book is an analysis of the following three forms of reciprocity: (1) the

reciprocity of the contract or ‘cautious’; (2) the reciprocity of friendship or

philia and (3) the ‘unconditional’ reciprocity, the one more controversial, but

that represents one of the theoretical foci of my discourse. But, unlikely the

‘separation of principles’ vision, my approach to the forms of reciprocity is

basically different: the main message of the book will be a call for contamination

and alliance amongst different forms of social interactions.

The cultural perspective of the book is, in fact, that of the so-called Civil

Economy,5 namely the conception, both theoretical and practical, which considers

civil society as a multidimensional and polycentric dynamics, based on

the dialogue and ‘reciprocity’ between different forms (or principles) of relationships:

from contract to reciprocal gift, where principles of social life are

not seen in opposition, but basically in a complementary relation.

One of the goals of this book is to show that contract (self-interested