# kaal:claim:6890879-002

**Claim.** Cooperation is sustained when interaction is repeated, memory of past conduct persists, and that memory has consequences; in an economy of agents those conditions must be supplied by an explicit, portable signal, and reputation is that signal.

**Type.** mechanism  **Support.** argued

**Holds when.**

- the practical reading of the Folk Theorems for software agents

**Source quote.**

> Cooperation is sustained when interaction is repeated, when memory of past conduct persists, and when that memory has consequences for future opportunity. In a human institution, those conditions are supplied informally by social memory and formally by law. In an economy of agents, they must be supplied by an explicit, portable signal. Reputation is that signal.

**From.** Wulf A. Kaal, *From Neoclassical to Computative Labor: Foundations for a Testable Theory of Reputation Governance in the Agent Economy* (2026), II. The Foundational Theorem, page 2

**Cite as.** Wulf A. Kaal, From Neoclassical to Computative Labor: Foundations for a Testable Theory of Reputation Governance in the Agent Economy (2026). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=6890879

**Verify.** sha256 of source PDF `062ff740fd37295e1da5844353b6daae342bc07208665d114f28d6b1cd4cbdc9` at https://raw.githubusercontent.com/wulfkaal/Academic-Papers/main/papers/pdf/Kaal%20-%202026%20-%20From%20Neoclassical%20to%20Computative%20Labor%20Foundations%20for%20a%20Testable%20Theory%20of%20Reputation%20Governance%20in%20the%20Agent%20Economy.pdf

**Topics.** reputation, ai-and-agents, economics

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