The "prisoner's dilemma": A proposal to amend the model to be implemented on international relations strategy

The "prisoner's dilemma": A proposal to amend the model to be implemented on international relations strategy

On the occasion of a video – among other similar ones – circulated on the internet regarding the problem of game theory, known as "the prisoner’s dilemma", an attempt to explain the problem is summarised below, but, moreover, a proposal to extend it, is also attempted towards the implementation of its forecasts, on international relations strategies.

The dilemma (= option of a dual trait), described in the video, is in fact a paradox of analytical calculus, in terms of the conducive part of the analysis, i.e. the decision-making. So, what have we got here? Two individuals, each with personal interests, ultimately (as we usually say at the end of the day) do not achieve the best for them. So they do not succeed it, as they choose, each for themselves, their own salvation and the burden of the other. The result is that they are both in a worse situation than they would have found if they cooperated in the decision-making process! That is to say, the game theory (i.e., optimal decision of independent players participating in a backdrop with various strategic options) of an amended version.

Well, the theoretical approach is good, an approach of numerical analysis – in a broad sense – as we put it above, but it might be appropriate to be more practical.

In this light, on the most practical view, we could extend the (numerical) analysis of an amended model of the problem in question, i.e. the 'prisoner dilemma' and start discussing a realistic approach to a similar problem, of another level: the 'problem of international cooperation'.

States are by definition the players of the international political scene. Consequently, each state, in a role of that kind, aims to profit over the others regardless of its willingness/preference to cooperate (or not). In the conventional "prisoner's dilemma" the analysis does not go into the players' expected gains according to their preferences or the potential/capacity of the players in impeding (vetoing) international cooperation. This is precisely where the conventional problem of the "prisoner’s dilemma" needs the above mentioned amendment, so that its analysis also provides for the preferences of the players-states gains and the profits that correspond to them regarding the management of impeding (or not) the so-called international cooperation.

A typical example of the implementation of this latest case of play (i.e. the management of international cooperation) is, nowadays, the movements of some leaders such as the President of the US,  D. Trump (see refusal to participate in international cooperation on various issues, such as climate change, international trade and business deals, etc.), French President E. Macron (see moves in the opposite of the "player" Trump’s moves, which contribute to international cooperation on the aforementioned issues or even more, discovering, highlighting and throwing at the table of the international game new issues of international cooperation, etc.). Other international leaders, representing players-states of a smaller scope, are working on some similar moves, such as our well-known and non-exceptional Turkish R T Erdogan, who in the early period of his career "played" by promoting international cooperation while later on and still at the current juncture "playing" on the contrary, i.e. with the so-called "adverse" options, blocking international cooperation even within some by definition international cooperative organisations (see NATO, OSCE, etc.).

On the basis of the above analysis of both the conventional standard of the "prisoner’s dilemma" and its proposed amendment/expansion into international relations between states-players, it is obvious that, the application – at least if not the theoretical numerical analysis of the model too – of the amendment/extension of the model into international relations, which we here proudly and urgently attempt to explain, has long been discovered/analysed by the advisors and/or some strategic analysis think tanks, which support the aforementioned leaders and not only those. And, of course, the leaders have not taken away the opportunity to move forward with the implementation!