Schelling, Thomas C. (Born 1921)

Abstract

Thomas Schelling has contributed path-breaking works to the study of coordination problems, group behaviour, and self-control. Early in his career, he framed the Cold War as a game in which parties have a mutual interest in coordinating their actions through a ‘focal point’. Later he explained how, in the absence of racism, racial segregation may be triggered by a ‘tipping’ process through which residential homogenization feeds on itself. His latest major insight has been that addictions stem from an inability to reconcile conflicting inner drives.