Shuige Liu

Post-doctoral Research Fellow, Department of Decision Sciences, Bocconi University.

Trained in game theory and logic, I study behavior in strategic environments, with a particular interest in how people reason about one another and how cognitive and informational limits shape behavior and institutions.

Drawing on game theory, logic, and decision theory, I develop formal models with clear epistemic foundations that are both theoretically disciplined and testable. I use these models to address broader social and political questions, including international order, polarization, propaganda, and misinformation.

CV (May 23, 2026 ver.)

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Available for academic positions from September 2026 in economics, political economy, and related fields.

Research Interests

Strategic reasoning
Epistemic foundations and bounded rationality
Political economy of international order and misinformation

Current Research

The Structure of Bounded Reasoning

This research project asks what “bounded reasoning” really means. In particular, it develops an epistemic game-theoretic framework that distinguishes bounded reasoning driven by beliefs about others’ types from bounded reasoning driven by limits in higher-order reasoning. It aims to clarify what observed level-k behavior does (and does not) reveal about underlying reasoning structure.

Reasoning about Bounded Reasoning (with Gabriel Ziegler)

Language, Reasoning, and Complexity

This project starts from a simple but under-explored idea: human beings reason through language. If so, epistemic and practical reasons should be modeled not only in terms of what is true or probable, but in terms of what can be expressed, derived, and justified within a formal language. This motivates a shift from purely semantic models toward syntactic and proof-theoretic representations of reasoning.

Measuring Information Burden: From Coalition-Based Reasoning to the Price System (May 23, 2026 ver)

This paper develops a proof-theoretic framework for asking and answering what kind and how much information is sufficient for decentralized decision-making, and uses it to show an informational inconsistency behind the Debreu-Scarf theorem: the core path to competitive equilibrium requires an informational burden that grows with the size of the economy, while competitive equilibrium itself does not.

Great Power Politics and International Order

This project studies great-power politics through the lens of international order. More broadly, it asks how international orders form, how their governance and commitment structures evolve, when they are sustained or revised, and under what conditions a new order emerges. It also examines how these processes are shaped by the alignment choices of states and the institutional roles of international organizations.

When Hegemons Revise: Transactionalism, Dependence, and International Order (slides; with Tomoo Kikuchi and Lien Pham; working paper available soon)

Pecuniary Externality, Ideology and Sphere of Influence (with Tomoo Kikuchi and Lien Pham)

Misinformation, Networks, and Political Behavior

This line of research studies belief formation and strategic behavior under distorted informational environments. I am interested in how misinformation and disinformation spread through social networks, how social pressure and strategic incentives shape individual reactions, and how these micro-level dynamics affect broader political and institutional outcomes.

When Truth Does Not Take on Its Shoes: How Misinformation Spreads in Chatrooms

Publications

Quantal Response Equilibrium and Rationalizability: Inside the Black Box (with Fabio Maccheroni), Games and Economic Behavior 157 (2026): 496-515.
Characterizing Permissibility, Proper Rationalizability, an Iterated Admissibility by Incomplete Information, International Journal of Game Theory 50 (2021): 119-148.
Monotonic Core Allocation Paths for Assignment Games (with Takaaki Abe), Social Choice and Welfare 53 (2019): 557-573.
Directed Graphical Structure, Nash Equilibrium, and Potential Games, Operations Research Letters 46 (2018): 273-277.
Elimination of Dominated Strategies and Inessential Players (with Mamoru Kaneko), Operations Research and Decisions 25 (2015): 35-54.

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