FOLLOWING THE PUBLICATION of Brander and Taylor's 1998 paper, "The simple economics of Easter Island: A Ricardo-Malthus model of renewable resource use," in the American Economic Review, resource economists have been interested in further developing a model to show how conflict, human institutions and customs, and technological change might act and interact to exacerbate or ameliorate the feast-famine or predator-prey cycle that caused catastrophe on Easter Island (Rapa Nui).</p
