| This dissertation explores the conceptual basis of “verifiability” by explicitly modeling the process of evidence production in contractual relationships of complete information. I study how the contracting parties' incentives to disclose evidence (in the form of documents) narrows the set of enforceable contracts and affects what can be considered verifiable. Further, I study the relationship between parties' incentives, cost of producing evidence, evidence presented, and court action in several models. This theoretical analysis helps yield insights about methods of fact-finding and legal institutions. Chapter II provides a foundation for verifiability in a general n -player model where the availability of evidence is state contingent. In Chapter III, I explore the limits of verifiability induced by the production of available evidence being costly. In Chapter IV, I study the relationship between the suppression of evidence and enforcement costs, and compare the relative merits of adversarial and inquisitorial systems of civil procedure. |
