Causes of Stability in Dynamic Coalition Formation

Abstract We study the formation of stable outcomes via simple dynamics in cardinal hedonic games, where the utilities of agents change over time depending on the history of the coalition formation process. Specifically, we analyze situations where members of a coalition decrease their utility for a leaving agent (resent) or increase their utility for a joining agent (appreciation). We show that in contrast to classical dynamics, for resentful or appreciative agents, dynamics are guaranteed to converge under mild conditions for various stability concepts. Thereby, we establish that both resent and appreciation are strong stability-driving forces.