Abstract

What explains the existence and persistence of institutions? This article centres on Guala and Hindriks' functionalist theory of institutions, which explains their existence and persistence by their overall beneficial consequences, where these consequences are not the intentional product of individual or collective human decisions. According to them, institutions exist and persist because they generate “cooperative benefits”, through their ability to solve coordination problems. This article aims to show that their theory is lacking in at least three respects. First, indeterminacy in the selection of coordination devices weakens its predictive power. Second, their account relies on an inappropriate conception of the benefits of institutions, which makes it unable to explain why some institutions exist and persist while others do not. Finally, it lacks empirical support from history.