A Cooperative Approach to the Logic of Collective Action: Voluntary Organizations and the Prisoners ’ Dilemma

A reexamination of certain tenets of Olson’s logic of collective action suggests that it fails to explain some types of behavior found in voluntary organizations, especially mutual assistance groups. Specifically, Olson fails to account for non-coercive and non-individualistic factors and gives insufficient attention to the social context of voluntary organization life. A fresh applications of the prisoners ’ dilemma and the introduction of the concept of community expand our understanding of behaviors heretofore unexplained. Implications are discussed for the design and management of voluntary organizations under certain conditions. Man’s distinguishing characteristic is the ability to think-and through thinking to cooperate. Ibn Khualdun, Arabian sage, 1332-1406 Mancur Olson’s (1965) exposition of the logic of collective action has profoundly influenced the way most students of voluntary organizations conceptualize the prob-lem they confront in trying to understand the basis of these associations. Olson argued that rational individuals will cooperate to produce collective goods for larg