Game Theory
Game theory has now produced an almost unmanageable variety of approaches, which are utilised and promoted by conflict research, cooperation research, negotiation theories, behaviour theories and competition theories. Interestingly, the mainstream of the variants applies conditions which are inapplicable for everyday (manageable numbers of ‘players’ and ‘rules’, finite time for the ‘game’, rational approaches of the stakeholders and many more).
So-called population games or evolutionary game theory are less researched, because they are mathematically more difficult or hardly representable any more. When looking at social processes from a meta-theoretical viewpoint, the conceptualising of limited rationality, the regard for self-stabilising effects, the inclusion of behavioural patterns, habits, or the explanation about how these are formed – are all necessary to be able to utilise game theory findings for the description of communication patterns in organisations, teams, and in sustained conflict situations.