Will Equity Evolve? An Indirect Evolutionary Approach

It has been claimed that people often prefer equity-like considerations and tend to ignore strategic aspects in fair division problems. Here, this is explored by analysing whether or not such a behavioural disposition is evolutionarily stable. The answer, however, is ambiguous: Both, reacting to and neglecting strategic aspects can be evolutionarily stable strategies when power discrepancies are minor. Equity, in particular, is restricted to situations where structural asymmetries are subtle.