--- title: Game Theory description: Game theory is the mathematical study of strategic decision-making among rational agents. Learners will understand how to model competitive situations, predict opponent behavior, and identify optimal strategies in economics, business, and social sciences. category: finance-economics subcategory: economics-(social-lens) difficulty: beginner, intermediate, advanced url: /subject/game-theory --- # Game Theory Game theory is the mathematical study of strategic decision-making among rational agents. Learners will understand how to model competitive situations, predict opponent behavior, and identify optimal strategies in economics, business, and social sciences. ## Available Resources 6 Books • 3 Courses • 1 Websites • 1 Papers ## Books ### 1. Modern Poker Theory **Author:** Michael Acevedo 2019. The systematic GTO reference: ranges, blockers, indifference and bet-sizing theory. **Difficulty:** Advanced | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/1909457892?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** poker, GTO, game theory ### 2. The Art of Strategy: A Game Theorist's Guide to Success in Business and Life **Author:** Avinash K. Dixit, Barry J. Nalebuff Non-technical treatment of strategic reasoning: credible commitment, backward induction, mixed strategies, brinkmanship, auctions, and voting, worked through cases from politics, sports, television, and business. Arithmetic-level math only, but the underlying structure matches formal coursework. Written by two research economists, it teaches real solution concepts through cases rather than offering negotiation hacks. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0393337170?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** game-theory, strategy, bargaining, auctions, popular-economics ### 3. Game Theory (Fudenberg & Tirole) **Author:** Drew Fudenberg, Jean Tirole Graduate reference treating equilibrium refinements, repeated games and folk theorems, Bayesian games, sequential and perfect Bayesian equilibrium, reputation effects, and signaling, with full proofs throughout. Assumes real analysis and probability. Standard text in doctoral economics sequences worldwide. **Difficulty:** Advanced | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0262061414?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** game-theory, microeconomics, repeated-games, bayesian-games, graduate-textbook ### 4. An Introduction to Game Theory **Author:** Martin J. Osborne Undergraduate textbook covering strategic, extensive, and coalitional games plus repeated games, bargaining, and evolutionary equilibrium. Definitions are stated precisely while proofs stay readable. The author's official site hosts six free sample chapters and a complete solutions manual for every exercise. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0195322487?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** game-theory, microeconomics, nash-equilibrium, bargaining, textbook ### 5. The Evolution of Cooperation **Author:** Robert Axelrod Axelrod's account of iterated prisoner's dilemma tournaments, where TIT FOR TAT prevailed. Readers come away able to explain how cooperation emerges among self-interested actors without central authority, and why reciprocity stabilizes it. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0465021212?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** game-theory, prisoners-dilemma, cooperation, tit-for-tat, reciprocity ### 6. Game Theory: An Introduction **Author:** Steven Tadelis Tadelis's Princeton University Press textbook moves from rational decision making through strategic and extensive-form games, Bayesian games, repeated games, bargaining, auctions and mechanism design. Readers finish able to model strategic situations and solve for equilibrium with proofs and exercises. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0691129088?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** game-theory, nash-equilibrium, bayesian-games, mechanism-design, microeconomics ## Papers ### 1. Equilibrium Points in N-Person Games (Nash, 1950) **Author:** John F. Nash Jr. Nash's two-page PNAS note proving that every finite n-person non-cooperative game has at least one equilibrium point in mixed strategies, via Kakutani's fixed-point theorem. Free scanned full text and PDF of the paper the field is built on. **Difficulty:** Advanced | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1063129/ **Tags:** game-theory, nash-equilibrium, mathematical-economics, fixed-point-theorems, primary-source ## Websites ### 1. Game Theory (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) **Author:** Don Ross Peer-reviewed reference article covering game theory's philosophical foundations, utility and rationality assumptions, strategic and extensive forms, equilibrium refinements, and behavioral and evolutionary extensions. Cites primary literature throughout and addresses conceptual disputes that textbooks usually pass over. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/game-theory/ **Tags:** game-theory, decision-theory, rationality, philosophy-of-economics, equilibrium-refinements ## Courses ### 1. Economic Applications of Game Theory (MIT 14.12) **Author:** Ian Ball Covers dominance, Nash equilibrium, extensive-form and repeated games, and games of incomplete information, applied to cartels, voting, bargaining, auctions and evolution. Includes 25 lecture videos, lecture notes, problem sets and exams, preparing learners to model strategic interaction formally. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/14-12-economic-applications-of-game-theory-fall-2025/ **Tags:** game-theory, nash-equilibrium, repeated-games, auctions, bargaining ### 2. ECON 159: Game Theory (Open Yale Courses) **Author:** Ben Polak Twenty-four filmed Yale lectures covering dominance, backward induction, Nash equilibrium, mixed strategies, evolutionary stability, and asymmetric information, with problem sets, exams, transcripts, and readings. Polak develops each concept through classroom games played by students before formalizing it. Teaches strategic reasoning through live classroom games first, formalism second, which makes it the correct entry point before Osborne or MIT 14.12. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://oyc.yale.edu/economics/econ-159 **Tags:** game-theory, nash-equilibrium, mixed-strategies, evolutionary-stability, video-lectures ### 3. Game Theory **Author:** Matthew O. Jackson, Yoav Shoham, Kevin Leyton-Brown Stanford and University of British Columbia course on the mathematical modeling of strategic interaction: normal and extensive form games, Nash equilibrium, mixed strategies, Bayesian games, and repeated and stochastic games. Learners can formalize strategic situations and solve them for equilibria. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.coursera.org/learn/game-theory-1 **Tags:** game-theory, nash-equilibrium, extensive-form-games, bayesian-games, repeated-games --- *This content is part of Dantes.io - Your Treasure Map to Knowledge* *Curated by humans at Dantes.io. Personal study use welcome; republishing this curation requires permission (team@dantes.io).* View this page online: https://dantes.io/subject/game-theory