Game Theory Explains the Leaks in Trump’s White House
This is an interesting idea that a New Yorker writer John Cassidy bring out responding to the recent White House’s leaks. In this beginning of the article, Cassidy introduce the birth of Game Theory by Albert Tucker in 1950, and the classic prisoners’ dilemma. The basic idea, again, is that it’s the best interest for both prisoners to confess to reach the Nash equilibrium. Although both prisoners refuse to confuse will result the lightest penalties for them, the problem is the lack of trusts between people.
This is exactly the reason for the entire leaking phenomenon in Trump’s White House, which Cassidy describes “ever since Trump became President, the White House has leaked like a sieve”. The lack of trust, which further creates “the factionalized, dog-eat-dog culture” inside the White House, incites people in the White House to take actions that are damaging to the Administration before someone else will bring them down by doing the same. Compared with the White House under both Obama and Clinton, team spirit was strong enough for mutual denial to be the rule. That’s one reason why damaging leaks in those Administrations were relatively rare.
Cassidy also mentions another classic story “Mexican Standoff” to explain this situation: “everyone has guns (leaks) pointed at each other and it’s only a matter of time before someone shoots. There’s rarely a peaceful conclusion so you might as well shoot first.”
Unfortunately, this “leak phenomenon” is common not just in the White House, but also in our daily life. The lack of trust between people happens across all sorts of organizations and groups. So in terms of game theory, how can we encourage people to reach an equilibrium strategy so that the total damage will decrease? Cassidy mentions that one way to change this poisonous culture is to alter the rewards and punishments that individual staffers perceive to be attached to their actions. In this way, cooperation, rather than backstabbing, will be encouraged.
In my opinion, there are pros and cons for this suggestion. On one hand, it will encourage cooperation. On the other hand, it would also encourage the shielding for mistakes, which is the case the police don’t wanna see in prisoners’ dilemma. Therefore, how to make a balance between this two cases is the key to maintain a healthy atmosphere in any sorts of organizations and groups.
Resource: https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/how-game-theory-explains-the-leaks-in-the-trump-white-house