Rational Choice

Hugh Ward

1. Key Ideas and Assertions of the Author:

 Rational Choice Theory according to Elster (1989) is that ‘when faced with several
courses of action, people usually do what they believe is likely to have the best
overall outcome.’ It was developed by Anthony Downs and emerged in 1950’s to
1960’s.
 Individuals have all the rational capacity, time and emotional detachment to
choose the best course of action no matter how complex the choice.
 Individuals are self interested.
 In rational choice model, one must need to specify the rules of the game, roughly
what players can and cannot do; what they know and do not know.
 Rational Choice Theorists are committed to some form of empiricist epistemology.

2. Evidences Presented to Support Key Ideas and Assertions:

 This is in support to the assertion of the author in bullet number two in which
individuals when faced with different choices or alternatives, rational individuals
choose one of the highest rank feasible action/outcomes available to them.
 The claim that individuals are self-interested can be supported by the fact that
individuals really select options and decisions which the primary benefactor is
his/her own self. However, the concept of self-interest is extremely elastic for some
people tend to sacrifice their life for greater purpose.
 The fourth bullet can be explained by the concept of Game Theory. Game Theory
deals with situations with other’s choice of strategy affects your best choice and
vice versa. This also includes a strategy equilibrium in which there are set of
strategies one for each player-- such that no player can increase their payoff by
changing strategy given that no other player changes strategy.
 Because this model claims that a certain individual uses rationality and knowledge
in decision-making, the argument that rational choice theorists are committed to
some form of empiricist epistemology is right. This means that knowledge is
derived from the facts around the world and conducted using scientific methods,
observation and experimentation.

3. Applications/Conclusions
 Rational Choice Theory can help illuminate how structures arise and are
transformed, however it was then cleared that it’s not a stand-alone paradigm for
understanding the whole political sphere.
 Human has rational capacity in which when faced with obstacles and challenges
they can evaluate the costs of deeds and the consequences of an action. Further,
 human beings can foresee what lies ahead thus enabling them to evaluate what
and what must not do.
 Human beings have the ability to transform circumstances into its advantage.

Interpretive Theory

Key Ideas & Evidences

- The theory is focused on Wittgenstein’s analogy between language and games.

- The said theory basically implies that every game would have a rule of itself which
shall be recognized that define legitimate play. (Simply means, If you abide by the
rules of the game then you can say that you are playing the game but if you don’t,
then it can already be considered that you are playing an entirely different game
which goes by the rules you yourself made which makes it a “custom game”).

*One of the most distinctive features of a game are the rules.

- Language is very much the same which proves Wittgenstein’s analogy between
the two elements and both have a little substantive in common.
- Linguistic formations that did not conform to the positivist model are considered
arbitrary and misleading. But these linguistic formations that are criticized as
meaningless by the logical positivists are perfectly meaningful and we have no
grounds to prove that these formations are indeed inferior or superior to each other
for they have their own respective features that excels the other on different given
fields.
- There is no real authentic criterion which says that one is rather more real or
valuable than the other. As said, they have their own field of specialization.
- Interpretivism is basically a theory of social science which opposes the positivism
of natural science which basically says that the social realm is not subjected to the
same methods of investigations of natural world and that it requires epistemology
which does not use scientific method of the natural sciences meaning that
researchers need to be aware that our concepts, ideas, and language shape how
we THINK of this world. Positivist basically believes on sensory experience or fact
that has been SEEN and proven through reason and logic which forms the
exclusive source of knowledge.
- For evidence that support the idea, refer to bullet #2

Conclusions

- People discard facts that are not helpful to them and marks it as meaningless just
because it does not conform to them.
 - There is no such way to prove that one is inferior or superior to other. Everything
has its own use. It’s not based solely on what we THINK of it but also what we have
OBSERVED. Not all features are present on its appearance. It goes both ways.
- Not all facts are based on what has been seen or proved though reason and logic.
RELIGION is one big example.

Assumptions

- Challenging logical positivism with Wittgenstein’s analogy between language and

games.
- Winch’s model of scientific investigation which assumes investigations should aim
for further interpretation rather than causal explanation, which says that in order to
further know why a person did a certain action one should inquire into their reasons
because detailed statistical information on the relation between voting behavior
and class, occupation, gender and so on does not actually answer the question or
is just simply not enough to know what sets of beliefs they hold.

Application to Contemporary Politics

- Since contemporary politics is all about the discipline of political science,

normative theory questions goes like “what SHOULD have happened” while in the
interpretivist view its “what we THINK should have happened” and in empirical
view its “what HAVE happened”. Interpretive theory discusses the nature of people
to THINK what is good or bad for a certain situation or scenario which clearly
opposes the idea of positivism which implies that everything that is GOOD is
determined by experimentation, “what has been observed or seen”, and that facts
are proved through logic and reason.

Deontological and Value-Pluralism

1. Identify the key ideas, points, hypothesis, assertions, and postulations of the
author.
 Berlin argues against the logical positivist reduction of meaningful inquiry to
either the empirical or the purely logical.
 For Berlin, these authentically valuable ends and principles are themselves
always likely to conflict.
 John Rawls made important and influential contribution in which he seeks to
theorise a conception of justice, suitable to governing political communities,
in the light of irreconcilable moral disagreement.
 Rawls argument is deontological, affirming a fundamental ethical principle
that is independent of contexts and consequences and is grounded in basic
conditions governing human experience.
  Rawls developed a rational choice model. He invokes a hypothetical
“original position”, where persons are asked to choose principles of justice
to govern the basic institutional structure of society while being ignorant of
their own particular interests and beliefs.
 For Rawls, his principles encapsulate true social justice and they are, he
believes, necessarily the ones that rational people would choose.
 Rawls argues that his theory of justice concerns only basic institutional
arrangements and precisely avoids imposing any unitary moral vision upon
society.
 Rawls’ theory embodies principles of “the right” rather than “the good”.
 For Rawls, his theory of justice, while taking a ‘foundationalist’ approach,
does so in a way that is more modest and consequently less contestable
than are the approaches taken in older forms of political philosophy.
 Theories of justice developed by Rawls fail on two related counts. First, in
delivering authoritative principles that are minimal, governing only the
“impersonal” terms of institutional interaction, such theories assume that
human societies embody no shared substantial conceptions of the good of
forms of ethical solidarity. Second, Rawls miss elements of ethical
solidarity.
 Communitarians accept that it is certainly possible to theorise forms of
moral consensus that ground authoritative normative principles. These
consensus are based not upon claims of the human individuals but rather
upon recognition of how individuals construe themselves.
 Modern societies are composed of multiple social, cultural, ethnic, and
sexual groupings displaying divergent identities and commitments.

2. Evidences on how the author supports his ideas. Substantiate.

Berlin argues against the logical positivist reduction of meaningful inquiry to

either the empirical or the purely logical for there are many questions that resist
being answered in either of these ways and one of those involved
value-judgements. When it comes to normative questions, there will never be
settled agreements or as if they can be answered in terms of objective fact for we
inhabit a world of value-pluralism, where there are different value systems in the
world which may be equally correct and fundamental, and yet in conflict with each
other. As a result, no one value-system can incorporate all that is valuable and any
such system will prioritise some values and relegate others. With these, there will
always be competing value-systems to which people adhere, and there is no
objective criterion by which we could decide which system is right.
 John Rawls made important and influential contribution in which he seeks to
theorise a conception of justice, suitable to governing political communities, in the
light of irreconcilable moral disagreement. Rawls argument is deontological,
affirming a fundamental ethical principle that is independent of contexts and
consequences and is grounded in basic conditions governing human experience.
Rawls developed a rational choice model. He invokes a hypothetical “original
position”, where persons are asked to choose principles of justice to govern the
basic institutional structure of society. However, the choice is limited and there’s a
requirement represented in rational choice model in which people should not be
biased in their own favour. Rawls concludes the principles that would be chosen in
this situation, and they have strong normative implications. People would choose
principles that require the maximisation of basic liberties that would ensure that
everyone, particularly the less fortunate, benefit from the system. These principles,
for Rawls, encapsulate true social justice and necessarily the ones that rational
people would choose. Rawls’ theory embodies principles of “the right” rather than
“the good”. It is based on minimal claim about what people have in common and
aims only at providing principles that would fairly regulate the interactions of
people who differ in terms of how they wish to lead their lives. Theories of justice
developed by Rawls fail on two related counts. First, in delivering authoritative
principles that are minimal, governing only the ‘impersonal’ terms of institutional
interaction, such theories assume that human societies embody no shared
substantial conceptions of the good of forms of ethical solidarity. Second, Rawls
miss elements of ethical solidarity.

3. Application and Conclusion

In conclusion, there is a plurality of ideals, as there is a plurality of cultures and of

temperaments. There is a multiplicity of values in plural societies which cannot be
reduced to a single principle, or a universal permanent combination of values applicable
to all individuals and all practical cases. That is to say, there are many of them, all
perfectly genuine, and their distinctness – their plurality – is irreducible: they cannot be
redefined or translated in such a way that they all turn out to be different manifestations of
one super-value such as happiness or utility or obedience to some alleged supernatural
dispensation. Berlin believed that our values are often incompatible and at times
incommensurable – that is, not jointly measurable on a common scale. Each value is its
own yardstick, and there is no independent measuring-rod that can be used to referee
clashes between them. For Berlin stated that these authentically valuable ends and
principles are themselves always likely to conflict like values of liberty and equality.

For Rawls, he deploys an account of the basic conditions and implications of people’s
rational autonomy in order to develop a theory of social justice grounded in fairness
where he developed rational choice model. Persons are asked to choose principles of
justice to govern the basic institutional structure of society however the choice is limited
and that people should not be biased in their own favour.

4. Agree/Disagree

Berlin was surely right and indeed an enormous and enthusiastic academic literature
about his kind of pluralism that has grown up in recent years. I agree with him on his claim
about pluralism that it is impossible to rank those different value-structures or many
different moralities to some ideal blueprint for human life. It is impossible to reduce some
values to others or to derive some values from others, or to combine them all into a single
higher value or a permanent combination of values. We do not have any clear criteria on
which to decide which value should be neglected and which one ought to be incorporated.
For instance, if I am in the grip of an anti-pluralist view of morality and politics, then it will
be natural for me to think of my own moral and political outlook as not only right for myself,
but as equally right for everybody; it will be an essential part of my moral personality that
I regard my moral priorities as applying universally.
I agree also with Berlin’s view about cultures cannot be wholly incommensurable,
because if they were, we would have no understanding of other cultures or periods. But,
for Berlin, we are capable of such intercultural or transhistorical understanding, however
partial, and what makes this possible is a common ‘human horizon’ of moral experience

The sorts of social principles that Rawls wishes to affirm such as redistribution to the
less well-off, are hard to justify if one starts from the premise of the self-interested
individual with no intrinsic social ties: one is always likely to be vulnerable to more
libertarian critics who will argue that if individual autonomy is the axiomatic principle, then
requiring people that they contribute to collective welfare is unacceptable.

5. Applying the theory during contemporary times.

The theory says that there can be many different value-structures, many different
moralities, without it being possible to rank them in an order of approximation to some
ideal blueprint for human life. This is crucial for the understanding and management of
differences between cultures, nations, traditions, and ways of life. For instance, in religion,
no single religion can claim absolute authority to teach absolute truth. Triumphalist
nationalism and most mainstream forms of religion have to be rejected as they are on the
anti-pluralist assumption that there is only one right way, superior to all other candidates.

Institutionalism
The key ideas presented by Vivien Lowndes is that traditional institutionalism was
generally unreflective on issues of theory and methods, took facts and values for granted,
and flourished as a kind of “common sense” within the political science. It was mostly
concern with the institutions of government, and yet it operates within a restricted
understanding of the subject matter. Its focus was more on formal rules and organizations
rather than informal conventions; and upon official structures of government rather than
broader institutional constraint on governance.
New institutionalism was more open when it comes to issues concerning theories and
methods and is marked with diverse theoretical projects.
Looking at political institutions in the USA, Britain, France and Germany avoiding a
country by country analysis but comparing them institution by institution across countries.
Describing an understandable version of the traditional approach. The analysis is
grounded on the understanding that the state is the ‘monopoly of coercive power.’
Explaining the shift from Keynesianism to monetarism in the UK, it was argued that
political institutions formed policies by influencing how new ideas came to be and how
those ideas were expressed in government decisions.
New institutionalism does not require any one particular theory, but it does demand a
critical stance towards theory. The strength of new institutionalism may be found precisely
in its multi-theoretic character, which allow for the assessment of competing propositions
drawn from different political theories. New institutionalism examines the role, function
and design of institutions in EU foreign policymaking, focusing on why and how
institutions are created (i.e. institutions as dependent variables) and how institutions
affect policy-making and policy-makers (i.e. institutions as independent variables).
The author’s idea of the characteristics of the institutionalism that it can be misleading to
describe new institutionalism as ‘a theory’ is agreeable. Since institutionalism changed
and adapted to the current trends of research overtime it cannot be encapsulated into a
specific field. Rather it is better understood as what Gamble (1990:405) calls a
‘organizing perspective” it provides a direct map to the central subject of the questions. It
is a broad variegated, approach to politics. Old institutionalist style of smuggling their
assumptions under a veil of “common sense” changed by the diverse and unchained
ways of the new institiutionalist which does not require a specific theory. Its strength is
found in this aspect which can be easily used as a resource material in research or
comparative studies that is based on a different theoretical analysis.
An example of a situation which this idea can be applied is that if one is conducting a
particular study it is not hinged on the limitations of certain theories since new
institutionalism’s characteristic is multi-theoretic it may give multiple options in the study
that it is being used. Unlike other theories that may be limited to a certain scope.
The application of these ideas and theories, historically speaking North Korea is far
different from other countries. During the cold war North Korea is one of the eight
communist bloc nations that resisted against the United States because in the normative
approach their norms, values, world views, religion and beliefs are inversely proportional
to the democratic states. They base their policy making through these cognitive content
that has been embedded to them since they have been born. Historically they wanted to
build nuclear weapons out of the need to protect their state from other countries’ threats.
They isolate themselves because they want to protect their political cultures and
traditions from the views and opinions of other countries. The only intention of the said
government is also the single idea that is instilled in the minds of the people.
Marxism

 Classical Marxism as a dominant interpretation of Marxism

 It talks about how economism, determinism, materialism and structuralism

affect the sectors of the society.
 The economic relation determines the social relation and the social relation
affects the political relation. For example, the economy is represented by
money, society is knowledge and politics is power. According to Marsh,
every sector of the society will conform to the basic requirement of the
economy. You can only gain knowledge if you have money since education
in early times is hard to pursue, you need money in order to achieve
standard education. Finally, power can be gained if you have knowledge or
money which brings you back to the main necessity which is money.
 The economic structure controls the agents of the society. For example,
the bourgeois who have knowledge and power can control political agents
with their wealth in order to satisfy their interests.

 Continuing transition from Classical Marxism to Contemporary Marxism

 The advent of technology and industrialization had given Marxism plenty of

considerations when it comes to the development of the society.
 Criticisms coming from both internal and external theories and actors had
constantly challenged the tenets of Marxism. For example, Marxism does
not constraint itself in the idea of economism wherein the economic relation
to the society is the most crucial and evident factor in the development of
society.
 The contemporary Marxism doesn’t only focuses on the economic
structure as the main issue of the society but there are other factors that
highly contribute to the rampant inequalities.
 As contemporary Marxism goes away with its traditional ideas it adopts the
criticisms which talks about class, gender and race as factor of structural
inequalities throughout the world.
 The collapse of the Soviet Union gave Marxism freedom from constraints in
an inhibiting legacy which hinders it to develop because of its association
with the Communism.
 Marxism: Economic, Social and Political Change

 Unlike Classical Marxism where it focuses on the economic relation as the

main factor of development, David Marsh argued that the changes in
economic, social and political contradicts the traditional Classical Marxism
that the sectors conform to the economic structure only. According to him,
the state in contemporary Marxism does not follow and approve the
interest of the ruling class but they are now an autonomous body of the
society where it analyses the laws that it would promote. In social change
people are more determined and there are already a massive growth of the
public sector and the decline of the manufacturing sector. As Capitalism
advances to international market, ruling elites would compete to a number
of TNC’s (Trans-National Corporation) and the world market itself in order
to gain profit.

 Marxism: A non-prevailing theory

 It was already more than one hundred years when the founder of Marxism
died, we cannot deny the fact that Marxism is not the most mainstream
ideology nowadays, this is because of the of the New Right Ideologies and
the Post- modern scientists and philosophers who continuously develops a
new and up-to-date theories and ideologies.
 Students particularly in Universities are most likely to delve into Marxism.

 Conclusion:

The author argued that Marxism though old and full of inconsistencies it
can still be a useful guide through confronting the challenges and critiques
from both external and internal theorists. It proved that it can go with the
advancement of the modern world. We cannot deny the fact that Marxism
has also its loopholes because no ideology is perfect in its nature. Also,
Capitalism as the main focus of Marxism is still evident nowadays that’s
why we would always look back to Marxism as bases of knowledge.
 We agreed with the author in his assertion that Marxism has more deals to
offer since some of its ideas are still relevant to the social issues in the
world, not just in the higher aspects of government and international
relations but also down to the most basic corporation and manner of
human life. It is also true that capitalism as its major topic is a prevalent
problem of most countries.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, Communism was instantly replaced by
ideas on Neo Liberalism and Capitalism and became the mainstream for
political systems mainly on Eastern Europe and other countries in Asia.
Capitalism and ideas on free market and trade have proliferated
throughout the globe but it too has flaws that needs to be tended. The
 ideological claim that markets work best when left to their own devices has
been exposed as a myth, which is evident on what had happened on the
major global crisis of the late 1990’s which started in Thailand in late 1997
when mixture of internal economic problems and imprudent engagement
with the freewheeling Western financial system resulted in a run on the
local currency and the collapse of the local stock market. The collapse was
contagious and the paranoia spread to other countries in Asia, which also
affected other western countries.
According to George Soros, he argues, “Unless we review our concept of
markets, our understanding of markets, they will collapse, we are creating
global markets without understanding their true nature”, he continues, “We
need some international regulations to match the globalization of markets
because what is lacking is the ability of society to impose constraints on the
market.”

Since there is no such thing as a “pure ideology” which is perfect in its

own nature, Capitalism in itself cannot handle the contradictions and the
challenges of the new existing idea of radical Socialism, which Marxism
can contribute to this renewed debate also with Naomi Klein’s idea on the
rise of anti-globalisation movements. Klein sees the world as a global
village which is characterized by exploitation and massive inequalities,
which Marxism, through its on-going transition is aiming to address since
struggle is not only limited to class but also to race and gender.

7 strains of Institutionalism

 Normative institutionalist - argues that political institutions influence actor’s behavior

by shaping their ‘values, norms, interest, identities and beliefs.’

 Rational choice institutionalist - argue that political institutions are systems of rules

and persuasion within which individuals attempt to maximize their usefulness.

 Historical institutionalist - look at how choices made about the institutional design of

government systems influence the future decision-making of individuals.

 Empirical institutionalist - classify different institutional types and analyze their

practical impact upon government performance.

 International institutionalist - show that the behavior of states is directed by the

structural constraints (formal and informal) of international political life.

 Sociological institutionalist - study the way institutions create significance for

individuals, providing important theoretical factors for normative institutionalism

within political science.

 Network institutionalist - show how regularized, but often informal, patterns of

interaction between individuals and groups shape political behavior.