Interactive Beliefs, Epistemic Independence and Strong Rationalizability

Abstract

We use a universal, extensive form interactive beliefs system to provide an epistemic characterization of a weak and a strong notion of rationalizability with independent beliefs. The weak solution concept is equivalent to backward induction in generic perfect information games where no player moves more than once in any play. The strong solution concept is related to explicability (Reny,[22]) and is outcome-equivalent to backward induction in generic games of perfect information.