The United Nations and the Rationale for Collective Intelligence ...

to their behaviour. Even if there are goals involved, the participants may not necessarily be aware of their importance within the context of a rational, selfish interest maximiser.⁵ Hence, ‘cooperation’ in the general sense could mean an awareness of issues or acceptance of a particular status quo, which are expressed variously in different cultures and circumstances.

Scholars have used the PD model in game theory to describe the difficulty in reaching agreements in cooperation, but this approach is problematic if used to interpret every social interaction and represent every aspect of the participants' behaviour as rational to the extent that they would not cooperate under the circumstances. As an explanatory concept, PD has been extremely useful in collapsing the multifaceted problem of social interactions into a single (linear) problem. It does not represent a real world situation.⁶ Game theory attempts to present a graphic illustration of the nature of conflict in a mixed interest environment, since it assumes that the choices individuals make may also depend on the choices others might make. The PD paradigm is widely used to dramatise this situation. The model assumes that in a situation of choice involving at least two actors, neither player knows what the other will do. Both actors are considered to be rational actors and would consider all logical options possible, given that the other player will do the same. An important aspect of the concept is that what each player gains depends not only on his own actions but also on those of the opponent.⁷ Hence, the strategy chosen by each player determines the outcome, and only one player can win at any one time.

This situation can be illustrated by looking at the choices available to two actors, A and B, faced with the choice of cooperating or defecting in a bargaining situation, which yields optimum outcome if both would cooperate. However, both actors would choose to defect to maximise their gains. A's choice can be expressed as A = (a,b) and, similarly, B = (a,b). In the following table (table 1.1), A's strategy is arranged in the row, and B's strategy is in the column. A must make a choice that increases his gains to at least not worse than -1 (i.e., A = (a,a)). Arguing in a similar vein as A, B makes the same choice; they both cooperate and maximise their gains. The idea is for each player to keep losses to