Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T04:01:43.714Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

3 - Social Roles, Common Knowledge, and Coordination

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 October 2021

Robert H. Sloan
Affiliation:
University of Illinois at Chicago Department of Computer Science
Richard Warner
Affiliation:
Chicago-Kent College of Law
Get access

Summary

Interactions in social roles typically involve the exchange of information. Those exchanges create coordination problems. A coordination problem is a situation in which each person wants to participate in a group action but only if others also participate. The relevant group action in social-role-mediated exchanges of information puts conditions on the flow and use of information. It is easy to solve such coordination problems when it is common knowledge that parties will all conform to the conditions. People’s presentation of themselves in social roles create such common knowledge that they will conform to standards of thought and behavior associated with those roles. We offer six examples of how common knowledge solves the coordination problems that typify social role interaction.

Type
Chapter
Information
The Privacy Fix
How to Preserve Privacy in the Onslaught of Surveillance
, pp. 43 - 77
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×