# kaal:claim:3782210-040

**Claim.** The Maghribi traders show that reputation alone can sustain a decentralized network under extreme information asymmetry: using only handwritten letters, Jewish merchants built a reputational system spanning the Silk Road in which nothing but the promise of better reputation deterred agents from cheating.

**Type.** empirical  **Support.** evidenced

**Holds when.**

- historical trading networks with communication latency on the order of months
- agents with complete control of assets

**Source quote.**

> Nothing incentivized the agents from cheating except the promise of building better reputation.

**From.** Craig Calcaterra, Wulf A. Kaal, *The Importance of Reputation for the Evolution of Decentralization* (2021), Summary, page 15

**Cite as.** Craig Calcaterra, Wulf A. Kaal, The Importance of Reputation for the Evolution of Decentralization (2021). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3782210

**Verify.** sha256 of source PDF `9cc531ab239f6266c8aeddcc8e54f4c06029c44e825444bee137bbcc0c9d0a8e` at https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wulfkaal/Academic-Papers/main/papers/pdf/Calcaterra%20and%20Kaal%20-%202021%20-%20The%20Importance%20of%20Reputation%20for%20the%20Evolution%20of%20Decentralization.pdf

**Topics.** empirical-evidence, ai-and-agents, corporate-governance, reputation

**Keywords.** maghribi-traders, historical-evidence, principal-agent, reputation

**Related claims.**

- extends: https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3782193-030
- supports: https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3782201-009
- extends: https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3782192-030

**Canonical form.** This markdown file is the canonical hashed representation of the claim. Its sha256 is the content hash used for attestation.