Showing papers in "Rationality and Society in 1990"

The Nature of Common-Pool Resource Problems

Abstract: This article presents a conceptual framework for theoretical and empirical analysis of the multiplicity of behavioral problems encountered in common-pool resources (CPRs). This framework is used to specify more clearly the strategic content of CPR dilemmas and to show their interaction. The framework shows how general theoretical constructs (e.g., Prisoner's Dilemma and coordination games) apply to these behavioral dilemmas. Finally, results from a case study and a set of laboratory experiments demonstrate the applicability of this framework in designing and conducting empirical research on CPRs.

Penalty has no Impact on Crime:: A Game-Theoretic Analysis

Abstract: Existing approaches consider crime as either the consequence of antecedent social conditions or the outcome of a rational calculation by a predator who chooses crime as a utility-maximizing career....

Games Real Actors Could Play: The Problem of Mutual Predictability

Abstract: The use of game-theoretical explanations and predictions in empirical social science research is often thought to be precluded by the unrealism of the cognitive and computational capabilities that mathematical game theory imputes to its idealized “players” as well as by the prohibitive information costs that an attempt to reconstruct these cognitions and computations would impose on researchers. The article tries to show that these misgivings are exaggerated. Under realistic conditions actors will often be able to pragmatically approximate complete-information conditions regarding each other's strategy options and payoffs. Moreover, empirical research will, in many situations, be able to reconstruct actors' relevant opportunities, perceptions and preferences from socially constructed institutions, norms, and expectations that have always been the subject of mainstream social science research.

The Attainment of Solidarity in Intentional Communities

Abstract: Sociologists have tended to assume that although rational-choice theory may be appropriate for the analysis of Gesellschaften, it is inadequate for the analysis of Gemeinschaften. Taking this assumption as its point of departure, this article shows that a theory of group solidarity built on rational-choice premises provides a superior account of the differential success of nineteenth-century American intentional communities (which are taken to be exemplary Gemeinschaften) than does the conventional sociological account.

Feminist Critiques of the Separative Model of Self Implications for Rational Choice Theory

Abstract: The article applies the radical-cultural feminist critique of the separative model of self to rational choice theories. Four assumptions of neoclassical economics-the “ideal type” of rational choice theories-are identified: selfishness; that interpersonal utility comparisons are impossible; that tastes are exogenous and unchanging; and that individuals are rational. For the most part, sociological versions of rational choice theories rely on these same assumptions. The article shows that a separative rather than a connected model of the self underlies each of these assumptions.

Substantive Positivism and the Idea of Crime

Abstract: Efforts to construct theories of crime consistent with a priori principles typically prove unsatisfactory. Awareness of this fact led the early positivists to reject choice theories in favor of dis...

A General Game-Theoretic Model of Preference Adaptations in Problematic Social Situations

Abstract: This article analyzes the active and intentional modification of preferences as a mechanism of cooperation in “problematic” social situations (i.e., situations where individually rational behavior generates outcomes that are suboptimal in the Pareto sense). It is shown that an intentional modification of preferences in such situations can result in a generalization of Sen's Assurance Game preferences. As a formal framework for the analysis, a noncooperative N-person preference adaptation game is used. In this game, actors are able to choose effective preference orderings of outcomes in an underlying problematic situation. Under rather general conditions, mutual choice of generalized Assurance Game preferences is an e-equilibrium point (Radner) in a preference adaptation game.

Reading Rational Choice Theory

Abstract: An interpretive reading is offered of contemporary sociological versions of rational choice theory, informed by the writings of Schutz, Garfinkel, Goffman, and Derrida. The topic of emotionality, as addressed by this theory, is central to the discussion. The ghost of a fully present, rational actor, as it haunts this theory, is examined, as are the terms choice and rationality.

Collectivities as Actors: Consistency of Collective Choices

Abstract: This article concerns the nature of “collective” preferences, when preferences inhere only in individuals. Economists (e.g., Arrow) have concluded that there is no reasonable way to combine individual preferences. Nevertheless, sociologists routinely treat collectivities (e.g., small groups, organizations, social classes, or ethnic groups) as entities with consistent preferences. This article suggests that consistency of collective choices arises from the social context. Specifically, many collective choices are matters of “judgment,” rather than matters of purely personal “preference.” In matters of judgment, natural groups tend to have shared standards that are used by individuals in determining their own preferences. Under such conditions, even when many individuals “get it wrong,” the group majorities tend to “get it right.” Social philosophers have suggested that when individuals attend to the public good, group majorities tend to accurately reflect the collective interest (Durkheim's “collective con...

Unraveling in Democratically Governed Groups

Abstract: This essay presents a framework for the analysis of voting processes in interest group organizations. It explores the tension between majority rule and membership maintenance in a group. The major theoretical propositions are that myopic majority rule government can cause instability and a loss of members from the group. The risk of this instability, which is called unraveling, leads to behavioral and institutional solutions that impose nonmedian social choices on the group members. The theory is applied to the founding era of the American Federation of Labor, an important, long-lived organization. It is shown that the most important features of the AFL in this century are best explained by reference to the theory of social choice in voluntary organizations.

Punishment in Iterated Chicken and Prisoner's Dilemma Games:

Abstract: Iterated playing of noncooperative games can result in full cooperation. Repeated playing of the noncooperative game permits the sucker to punish the initial defector by defecting in subsequent plays. This article shows that many n-person prisoner's dilemma (PD) games have chicken games embedded within them. In addition, positive externalities produce embedded chicken games, as physical coercion does when used to punish defectors. This characteristic has substantial implications for various solutions to iterated PD games. The difficulty encountered in chicken games is that the sucker must punish oneself in order to punish the defector. It is shown that various versions of the folk theorem, such as those by Friedman, Fudenberg and Maskin, and Abreu, do not extend to the chicken games under a number of realistic assumptions. Hence iterated playing by rational, self-interested actors will not result in cooperative behavior. What is needed to induce cooperative solutions is the presence of vengeful personalit...

The Utility of Bilingualism A Contribution to a Rational Choice Model of Language

Abstract: This article proposes an analytical model of linguistic behavior in a bilingual community. The starting point is the assumption that conversation is an interaction among individuals to which ration...

Rhetoric of Reason, Rhetoric of Passion Sociolinguistic Aspects of Instrumental and Expressive Rhetorics

Abstract: This article examines dilemmas of language use and interpretation, both in scholarly and vernacular speech settings, that render instrumental and normative attributions of motives problematic. These problems derive from the ambiguous status of utterances. Morally expressive and instrumental rhetorics, as used by folk actors, each may confer benefits, generate expressive solidarity, or indicate moral ends. Decision heuristics that fail to take this performative complexity into account compromise the methodological adequacy of scholarly depictions of motives and increase the risk of interpretive errors. Theorists of rational choice may discount spoken and written language as a reliable estimator of motives, thereby missing the underlying normative ideals which such rhetorics presuppose, deny, or obscure. Normative theorists may engage in the equally context-denying procedure of taking moral professions at face value, thereby missing the utilities and functions realized by normative talk. To the extent that ...

On the Formation of Exchange Relations in Political Systems

Abstract: Structural analysis has paid little attention to the formation of social ties. This article inquires into the origin of one type of tie, the exchange relationship, in a specific context, the political arena. The article focuses on the link between the configuration of actors' interests and the likelihood of exchange. Using the conceptual framework underlying Coleman's model of purposive action, two aspects of the interest configuration are specified: complementarity and ideological dissimilarity. Complementarity refers to the extent to which actors attach dissimilar importance to events in the political system, while ideological dissimilarity reflects the extent to which actors have different preferences for event outcomes. Prior work on social exchange makes the importance of complementarity clear, but this article holds that ideological dissimilarity impedes formation of exchange relations because it creates a lack of trust and a fear of harmful externalities. Informal experimental results are presented...

The Theory of Binding Commitments Simplified and Extended, with Generalization to Interpersonal Allocation

Abstract: Self-control theories of struggle among several coexisting “selves” have recently been offered to explain such behaviors as foregoing anesthesia, quitting smoking, and ordinary saving. Strotz formally modeled such situations without the concept of coexisting selves, however. This article (a) boils down the Strotz formalism to three simple present-value equations, (b) argues that the framework applies to many ordinary commercial transactions rather than only to exceptional personal decisions, (c) does not require the concept of simultaneous selves, (d) places the subject within conventional economics with the concept of externalities, and (e) suggests that intra-individual allocation is similar to allocation between the given individual and other individuals. The key assumption is that the discount between the individual's present “person” and the individual's future “persons” is great compared to discounts among the future persons. This assumption is central to the analysis of Strotz and to Ainslie's beha...

The Utility of Bilingualism

Abstract: This article proposes an analytical model of linguistic behavior in a bilingual community. The starting point is the assumption that conversation is an interaction among individuals to which rational choice analysis can be applied. Two attitudes—adaptive and nonadaptive—are defined. Using game theory, five types of linguistic behavior are established as a result of the different combinations of persons with adaptive attitudes and nonadaptive attitudes in conversation groups. The results of each linguistic behavior are evaluated for their effect on the promotion of any language. Likewise, the individual and collective utility of each linguistic behavior is calculated, introducing the concept of disutility of use of the second language. Finally, the most effective behaviors for the promotion of the majority language—a goal which seems to be pursued in many countries—are compared with the behaviors which bring about greater utility for individuals and the community.

Participation in Voluntary Organizations and Group Size

Abstract: Participation in collective action is hard to understand as rational behavior unless strong intrinsic benefits or selective social or economic incentives are assumed. This article describes the Status Competition Model for organizations in which members are motivated to participate for selective social rewards like the status attained from an annual “Medal of Honor.” Status is awarded on the basis of relative voluntary contributions. Using this model, the set of active members and its relation with the size of membership is studied. The number of volunteers is characterized in terms of the individual costs and benefits of participation. It is deduced that active members are necessarily very homogeneous with respect to a one-dimensional parameter of their costs and benefits. Hence the number of active members will be small if members differ nontrivially in their costs and benefits. Under some additional assumptions, it is argued that in similar kinds of organizations, the number of active members is propor...

Denzin on Rational Choice Theory

Abstract: The Forum consists of comments on previously published papers and responses by authors. Unlike the Comment section in many other academic journals, the Forum includes solicited as well as unsolicited contributions. We encourage debates by actively seeking points of view contrary to those expressed in articles published in the journal. The Forum section is intended to promote an open and critical debate that contributes to the intellectual vitality and further development of rational-choice-based theory and research. Forum contributions should follow the form used by Rationality and Society and should not exceed five double-spaced pages.