The course reviews the main concepts of Game Theory, both in the non-cooperative and cooperative models, and explains their importance in economics and other social sciences.

Lectures: 10 x 2 hour lectures

Tutorials: 10 x 1 hour

None

ILO

Reassessments are normally available for all courses, except those which contribute to the Honours classification. For non Honours courses, students are offered reassessment in all or any of the components of assessment if the satisfactory (threshold) grade for the overall course is not achieved at the first attempt. This is normally grade D3 for undergraduate students and grade C3 for postgraduate students. Exceptionally it may not be possible to offer reassessment of some coursework items, in which case the mark achieved at the first attempt will be counted towards the final course grade. Any such exceptions for this course are described below. 

The aims of the course are:

■ To show that most interactions of economic agents can be modelled as strategic games for instance, oligopolistic competition, face to face bargaining, multilateral exchange, auctions, and voting by majority.

■ To formalise such interactions by means of static or dynamic games, and the key concepts of Nash equilibria and core stability.

■ To explain when and if such equilibria can be found and how to compute them.

■ To interpret the light they cast on the economic question that motivates them in the first place.

By the end of this course students will be able to:

1. engage in formal modelling of a range of economic problems;

2. develop deductive and inductive reasoning in the context of interdependent decision-making .

3. develop a critical view of the simplifying assumptions necessary to formal strategic analysis, and its ability to accurately predict individual behaviour;

4. be able to identify and compute the strategic equilibrium outcome of the most familiar "economic games";

5. be able to develop new applications of the game theoretic methodology to the behaviour of economic agents interacting in markets, elections, and other social contexts.

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment.