Rational Choice Theory

It is sometimes claimed that Aristotle’s theory of the Mean is false or unhelpful:  moral virtues are not typically flanked by two opposing vices as he claimed.  However, a restatement of Aristotle’s view in terms of sufficiency for an objective reveals that the Mean is more widely applicable than has sometimes been alleged.  Understood as a special case of sufficiency, the Mean is implicit in many judgments of right and wrong.  I defend Aristotle against some objections, but acknowledge that a certain tension exists in Aristotle's theory of the good.

Rational choice theory is a framework formed in order to explain
organizational and economical behaviours in decision making process.
Basically, it is claimed that people calculate costs and benefits of their actions
before initiating to do any activity. Although Rational Choice Theory has a
quite important background which various social science fields benefit from, it
frequently confronts some criticisms especially coming from Human relations
school.
Bounded Rationality Approach offers an argument by claiming that human
being has limited mind to make optimum choices, therefore, tries to satisfy
rather than optimize. There is still an ambiguity in the literature whether these
two approaches should be used separately or mutually complementary.
Accordingly, this paper discusses whether Bounded Rationality Approach can
replace Rational Choice Theory by overcoming lacks of it. It is concluded that
Bounded Rationality Approach is not able to substitute Rational Choice Theory,
though its persuasive arguments provide an insight in order to comprehend the
complex decision making process.
Keywords: Rational Choice Theory, Bounded Rationality, Decision
Making Process

Returning to Reality. Science and Spirituality after the rediscovery of our embodied existence.
According to the tradition of sapiential philosophy, which includes thinkers like Thomas Aquinas, Meister Eckhart and Max Scheler, spiritual practices are not reducible to a matter of practical concern. They enable us to know the world that we inhabit, and shape our attitude towards reality, both in matters of practical and theoretical concern. More recent philosophical, phenomenological and neuro-cognitive research confirms this insight from a contemporary point of view: Even modern sciences cannot dispense with context-sensitive types of "emotional intelligence" that are governed by a responsive attitude toward our environment and rooted in our bodily existence. This programmatic essay shows how the premodern unity of science and spirituality can be recovered under late modern auspices and contrasts the anthropological and neuro-scientific implications of this turn from the representationalist delusions of modern thinkers like Descartes, Locke, Kant, Kahneman and the neurocognitive sciences of the late 20th century.

Generally, over the years rural crime in South Africa has been largely ignored and/or under-researched by academics, particularly from a criminological perspective. With the recent exception of a focus on wildlife poaching in rural areas (or more specifically the poaching of rhino), and to a lesser extent on stocktheft as a rural crime, most of the attention on rural crime in South Africa has been directed towards the so-called 'farm attacks', which have, more often than not, been taken out of context and/or politicised. Part of the problem in researching rural crime in South Africa has been of a definitional nature. For instance, in farm attacks, who are the 'farmers' and what constitutes a 'farm'? An example of the semantic confusion has been the fact that Gauteng Province-the smallest of the nine provinces in land area, but the industrial and economic heartland of South Africa-has the highest number of registered 'smallholdings/plots', but many of the owners/residents of such properties live there because of a lifestyle choice and not for any commercial or for-profit-farming enterprises. Also ignored in the analysis of rural crime are many of the 'other' victims of farm attacks, namely the farm workers and members of their families. Overall, as a rural crime, stocktheft in fact represents the biggest economic and crime impact on rural economies even though the usual range of violent crimes also occur in rural areas. This article seeks to broadly unpack rural crimes-with an exploratory focus on 'farm attacks' and stocktheft-within the context of South African areas outside of the major urban areas, inter alia touching on such aspects as the demise of the Commando System of rural protection and its belated replacement with a National Rural protection Plan in the late 1990s. From a number of the reports on farm attacks it was generally found that the primary motive for farm attacks was robbery and that such farm attacks should be dealt with and policed inclusively with all other forms of rural crime including that of livestock theft, particularly within the structures of the 2011 National Rural Strategy.

This article examines some unresolved problems about Boudon's concepts of cognitive rationality and rational action. Some classic examples used by Boudon to support his theory have been re-examined as well as its possible application to the case of alternative medicine. The actor's behaviour in certain situations could be hardly called "rational", nevertheless the search for the "a priori" elements leading his thinking and his representation of the situation seems to be a useful approach. Moreover the most common "a prioris" could be identified; the conditions of the actors' interaction and the influence of institutional constraints could be introduced in the "a priori" map. These elements have not always been explicitly considered by Boudon. The beliefs in the alternative medicine represent a case that could be explained by Boudon's theory integrated with the above mentioned elements. In this example the actor's health conditions, the cost-benefit balance of the various therapies, the everyday life interactions and the institutionalised expectations over the therapist's role model a kind of rationality grounded on well-defined "a prioris" in a given situation. In the background a general question still remains without answer: why do some people seem to be guided by a certain kind of "rationality" and some others do not?

This Thesis tries to explain why did Saudi Arabia conduct Proxy War to Iran in the Syrian Conflict. Since the beginning, Saudi Arabia and Iran had a stagnant relation; they are not far from confrontation. Their fight has always enlivened every conflict in the Middle East region, including the worst humanitarian problem in human history, which is the Syrian Conflict. Using Andrew Mumford’s proxy war theory and rational choice by focusing the approach on the rational actor model by Graham T.Allison, Saudi Arabia’s decision to take part in the Syrian Conflict through its proxies is based on the consideration of strategic outcomes and more rational cost-benefit calculations of proxy war.

Keywords: Proxy War, Proxies, Syrian Conflict, Hegemony, Strategic Outcome, Cost-Benefit, Saudi Arabia

Abstract: The concept of pluralistic ignorance refers to a situation in which virtually all members of a society reject a norm p but believe that virtually all members of this society endorse this norm. The paper aims at distinguishing various ways in which this concept can be used in legal-philosophical analyses. The paper is divided into two parts. The first part highlights the concept of pluralistic ignorance, distinguishing its various forms, which are called in the paper: strong, weak, behavioral, and mentalist. It also shows its relations to the concept of conformism and the so called 'bystander effect'. The second (main) part of the paper is aimed at showing that the concept of pluralistic ignorance can be gainfully invoked in the analysis of such legal-philosophical questions as legitimacy of power, validity of law, compliance with law, and relations of law and morality.
Abstrakt: Pojęcie pluralistycznej ignorancji opisuje sytuację, w której (niemal) wszyscy członkowie społeczności odrzucają normę p, ale wierzą, że niemal wszyscy ją akceptują. W artykule omówione zostały różnorakie sposoby, w jaki pojęcie to może być wykorzystane w rozważaniach filozoficzno-prawnych. Artykuł dzieli się na dwie części. W pierwszej części analizie poddane zostało samo pojęcie pluralistycznej ignorancji – wyróżnione zostały jego różne warianty: silny, słaby, behawioralny, mentalny, oraz omówione relacje z pojęciem konformizmu oraz tzw. efektem widza. W drugiej, głównej, części podjęto próbę wykazania, że pojęcie pluralistycznej ignorancji może się okazać przydatne w analizie takich filozoficzno-prawnych zagadnień jak legitymizacja władzy, obowiązywanie i przestrzeganie prawa, oraz relacje między prawem i moralnością.

This thesis offers a philosophical perspective on the different conceptions of agency and choice as they are understood and employed in economics and behavioral decision research—this perspective is two-fold: on the one hand, philosophical analysis can clarify ambiguities in definitions and concepts that can and do arise within interdisciplinary research. This is of particular importance given how philosophical concepts such as mind, cognition, and intentionality feature in economic studies of rational choice. Hence, one project of this thesis is to subject contemporary research on questions about agency and choice to such philosophical scrutiny. On the other hand, the questions and topics discussed in this thesis can be understood as an exercise in philosophy of science: they deal explicitly with questions and topics that pertain to the theoretical and empirical practices of scientists. This includes traditional microeconomic disciplines, such as decision and game theory, as well as interdisciplinary collaborations in behavioral economics, neuroeconomics, and experimental psychology.

The main task of this study is to challenge certain traditional ideas regarding identity and culture and to bring these themes within the scope of the rational choice theory. To this aim, the study is divided into two sections: first, the rational choice theory is presented as a model by explaining its basic assumptions such as utility maximization and methodological individualism; and second, this model is applied to cultural behaviors to obtain required rational explanations. The application will begin with the common traditional definitions of the concepts of culture and identity, and next, it will demonstrate that culture and identity are subject to cost-benefit calculation just like the issues that we have seen in the rational choice preferences. This research intends to view cultural behaviors as instances of rational choice and analyze these behaviors at the level of the individual. By modelling cultural behaviors as a product of individuals' rational choice, thus, this paper will offer a new perception concerning the nature of rationality and the freedom of choosing individual identity and culture.

"This work explores the institutionalized reasons for the decline of temples rather than the religious. I argue that the process of pagan temple destruction of the eastern provinces in the Later Roman Empire (c. late fourth and early fifth centuries) should not be understood as Götterdämmerung, a cataclysmic, sudden, and violent destruction of pagan shrines and temples, but rather what I call Tempeldämmerung, the gradual ruin of temples as provincial governors’ “benevolent light” of public funding no longer shined on these pagan temples — a fade into twilight.

This work uses economic theory to analyze and explain the incentive structure that would have led a provincial governor to prioritize the funding of other public buildings over the temples, resulting in their collapse from lack of maintenance. Economic theory is well suited to a study of how a provincial governor in general would have governed since a governor had to manage an allocation of finite resources and in doing so, was engaged in exchanges with his subjects. A governor interacted with his local elite through a system of mutual benefaction. This involved an exchange of offering benefactions, which could be honorific or practical, both being desirable nonetheless. This work asks the question, “Was the fall of pagan temples a result of rational behavior on the part of these governors?”"

This book presents a model for making ethical decisions both effectively and efficiently. Therefore, the model is much broader than a purely analytical framework. It must tell us how to act rather than limit us to reflection on actions already performed; it must combine decision and praxiological analysis of human conduct. The proposed model enlarges the scope of the debate and suggests new avenues of both rational and responsible decision making

Despite widespread disapproval of harm reduction strategies, and heroin substitution programs in particular, evidence from the Vancouver and Swiss trials both indicate that these public health measures are positively correlated with a decrease in the incidence of drug use and high treatment retention rates, as well as a reduction in crime and an increase in employment rates.

This paper examines the predictions of two widely accepted economic theories in the context of these harm reduction programs: the rational choice theory and the behavioural economic theory and explains how neither economic model can account for the empirical findings of the heroin substitution trials on its own. Rather, the observed trends are more thoroughly explained through a consideration of both rational choice theory and behavioural economic theory.

While predictions of the rational choice theory are consistent with empirical findings that peripheral societal costs associated with illicit drug use generally decrease in response to heroin substitution programs, it fails to account for other trends associated with illicit drug use. Behavioural economics thus helps to explain the other empirical data that have emerged from studies of heroin substitution programs. Therefore, a complete economics theory of addiction requires some acknowledgment that both of these theories of economics are valid and operate together.

textabstractThis thesis offers a philosophical perspective on the different conceptions of agency and choice as they are understood and employed in economics and behavioral decision research—this perspective is two-fold: on the one hand, philosophical analysis can clarify ambiguities in definitions and concepts that can and do arise within interdisciplinary research. This is of particular importance given how philosophical concepts such as mind, cognition, and intentionality feature in economic studies of rational choice. Hence, one project of this thesis is to subject contemporary research on questions about agency and choice to such philosophical scrutiny. On the other hand, the questions and topics discussed in this thesis can be understood as an exercise in philosophy of science: they deal explicitly with questions and topics that pertain to the theoretical and empirical practices of scientists. This includes traditional microeconomic disciplines, such as decision and game theor...

This article was written in response to the term ‘agency’ having become ubiquitous in academic writing.  In this critical overview, nine distinct domains are considered in which the ‘agency’ refers to a distinct phenomenon, each requiring an appropriate unit of analysis in order to be grasped concretely.

In the last two decades, the theory of multiple modernities has emerged as a new alternative for the former paradigms of the sociology of religion, the paradigm of secularization and the paradigm of rational choice theory. Theory of multiple modernities has led to a rethinking about the future of religion in modern societies and has raised new attempts to various paths of political and social development. Generally speaking, this theory explains that it cannot be clearly determined what will happen to religion in the process of modernization. This issue should be assessed separately, according to the culture that is in the context of modernization. This study tries to shed light on the concept of this theory, the process of formation, and historical backgrounds as well as to show one of its most significant applications in the contemporary time: democracy. I posit that moving toward the theory of multiple modernities has a strong correlation on revising the concept of modernity and understanding its various dimensions. Therefore, it is better to call each of these three paradigms as a “Quasi-Paradigm”.

"Corruption has become one of the most popular topics in the social scientific disciplines. However, there is a lack of interdisciplinary communication about corruption. Models developed by different
academic disciplines are often isolated from each other. The purpose of this paper is to review several major approaches to corruption and draw them closer to each other. Most studies of corruption fall
into three major categories: (i) rational-actor models where corruption is viewed as resulting from cost/benefit analysis of individual actors; (ii) structural models that focus on external forces that determine corruption; and (iii) relational models that emphasize social interactions and networks among corrupt actors. Focusing on actors’ behavior and the social context, this article explains corruption concepts taken from sociology, economics, organization studies, political science, social anthropology, and social psychology."

In this presentation I first underlined the need to distinguish between the illicit cross-border trade that the North Korean regime has been applying for almost forty years, serving also Chinese organized crime groups and the illicit trade that personnel from the State Security Department and the police of North Korea perform as their side business for earning some extra income. Moreover, for researching both phenomena empirically, I adjusted the rational choice theory and the general strain theory by connecting them to those Confucian values which still are relevant as informal norms in North Korea.

This chapter builds on my previous work on values in economics (Małecka
2020, 2021), and it brings insights from the philosophy of science (values
in science discussion) to achieve two goals. Firstly, I reflect on whether these insights shed new light on discussions about the positive and the normative in economics. Secondly, I show that they allow us to approach theoretical discussions on so-called rational choice theory from a novel and illuminating angle.
The chapter starts with a review of the state of the art in the philosophy
of science on the topic of values in science (Section titled ‘Values in Science: A Philosophy of Science Approach’) and from summarising current attempts to bring these insights from the philosophy of science to economic methodology (Section titled ‘Values in Economics: Recent Developments’). In the next step I argue that this approach in the philosophy of science allows us to re-evaluate the previous debates on the normative/positive distinctions that were mostly linked to the meta-philosophical views on the status of economics as a science (Section titled ‘Values in Economics: A Shift of Perspective’). Then I zoom in the focus of my analysis on the example of expected utility theory (EUT) to show how standard and well-established ways of understanding the theory are a result of value-laden interpretations of a formal framework, a point which so far has gone unnoticed in philosophical and theoretical discussions (Section titled ‘Between Rational Man and Cyborg. Values in Theory Formation: A Case of Expected Utility Theory’). The chapter concludes (Section titled ‘Conclusions’) by listing the main lessons that philosophers of economics, and possibly also economists, can learn from the vibrant debates on values in science in the philosophy of science.

La théorie moderne de la dissuasion et la rationalité coûts/bénéfices sont étroitement liées l’une à l’autre. En fait, sans cette dernière, la théorie de la dissuasion n’aurait plus de fondements puisqu’elle repose sur la croyance voulant que sous certaines conditions — ayant trait notamment à sa sévérité et à sa certitude — la sanction pénale peut décourager quiconque aurait l’audace de défier la norme pénale. La rationalité coûts/bénéfices constitue donc cette prémisse selon laquelle l’être humain gouvernerait son comportement, incluant le comportement criminel, à partir d’un calcul fait de coûts et de bénéfices. La généralisation de la portée de cette théorie de la décision constitue notre objet de recherche. La question qui se pose est celle de savoir si la théorie elle-même n’aurait pas trop exagéré la portée de cette rationalité coûts-bénéfices. Il ne s’agit pas tant de remettre en question le fait qu’elle puisse opérer ici et là, mais bien de réfléchir aux limites de sa généralisation, de se poser la question de savoir si compte tenu des données dont on dispose il est encore raisonnable, aujourd’hui, d’entretenir cette croyance à l’effet que tous les comportements dits criminels sont opérés dans le cadre de cette rationalité coûts/bénéfices. C’est la question que nous posons dans cette recherche exploratoire dont l’objectif est de cerner une rationalité inédite développée théoriquement par Pires (2002) et vérifiée empiriquement par Dubé (2012) : la rationalité du risque.
Dans cette recherche, ces dernières considérations nous amènent à traiter les postulats de la rationalité coûts/bénéfices comme des hypothèses et non comme des faits. Cette posture épistémologique se situe en dehors du positivisme et réintroduit le doute dans l’observation. Ce doute est alors confronté à une empirie particulière : il ne s’agit plus de tester la sévérité ou la certitude des peines telles que les conçoivent le droit criminel, mais bien de comprendre comment, dans la commission de leurs infractions, les individus se les représentent, comment ils les perçoivent, et quel poids leur attribuent-ils dans la décision de commettre ou de commettre à nouveau une infraction. Dans cette perspective qui s’inspire directement des approches phénoménologiques, la dissuasion est ainsi conçue comme un phénomène d’abord et avant tout subjectif. Au plan méthodologique, nous avons cherché à saisir ces « réalités subjectives » à partir d’entretiens qualitatifs semi-dirigés réalisés auprès d’individus ayant commis des crimes graves. Dans ces entretiens, plusieurs postulats de la théorie de la dissuasion sont ébranlés sous le poids d’une phénoménologie faisant ressortir les traits et fondements de la rationalité du risque, rationalité qui réduit la portée de la rationalité coûts/bénéfices tout en frappant d’impertinence le réductionnisme qui associe à la qualité de la peine la qualité de l’effet dissuasif.
À partir de nos observations empiriques, nous avons élaboré quatre (4) idéaux-types de trajectoires décisionnelles : pris dans leur ensemble, ceux-ci suggèrent que l’effet dissuasif de la sanction pénale est loin d’être aussi déterminant que nous a habitués à le croire le droit criminel moderne. Les résultats de notre recherche semblent en effet indiquer que dans bien des cas, la menace de la conséquence pénale se retrouve neutralisée par la rationalité du risque qui intervient dans l’esprit de l’individu pour reconvertir la « certitude » du coût en incertitude, en probabilité. Le coût n’est alors plus vécu comme un coût, mais bien comme un risque, comme une possibilité parmi d’autres et que l’individu a l’impression de pouvoir contrôler. La dissuasion générale se retrouve ainsi fragilisée. Par ailleurs, face à la condamnation, lorsque l’individu l’associe à l’échec du passage à l’acte, la rationalité du risque intervient encore pour remettre en question non pas tant, dans l’absolu, la décision de commettre le crime, mais bien la manière de le commettre. L’échec est alors associé soit à une mauvaise décision (qui n’est pas celle de commettre le crime), soit au fruit du hasard contre lequel on ne pouvait rien. Dans un cas comme dans l’autre, la dissuasion spécifique se retrouve ainsi fragilisée.

This article concerns the extent to which corrupt behavior is dependent on the organizational power structure and the resources available for illegal exchange. This qualitative study is based on 42 in-depth interviews with organizational actors in different organizations in Hungary. Four core themes emerged from the analysis of the interviews: (a) isolated corruption at the bottom, (b) the middle level’s own corruption, (c) “technicization” when middle-level professionals and expert groups are used to legalize the corruption of the dominant coalition, and (d) “turning-off controls” when organizational elites intentionally deactivate internal and external controls to avoid detection.

Putting the hypothesis of rational expectations to question resulted in an attempt to include irrational behaviour of investors in the financial market model. Let us remind that in classical models of the capital market (Sharpe's Single Index Model, Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM), International Capital Asset Pricing Model, Arbitrage Pricing Theory (APT), Portfolio Theory, etc.) irrational behaviour of actors was deemed unimportant. One of the first models to take into account the irrational character of participants of the capital market was drafted by H. Working in 1958. Working divided investors into two groups: a large group of well-informed investors and a small group of uninformed investors. Well-informed investors are able to reach information sooner than others. Uninformed investors need to rely on the noise and for this reason they may react immediately to fallacious information or react to actual information with a delay. As a result, fluctuations of share prices on the market extend over a period of time and they create short-term trends which are difficult to register by some instruments of technical analysis (Zielonka 2011). Working's work is moreover considered pioneer in the scope of risk management and hedging. Working pointed out that there existed various motivations and types of hedging; he argued that people who hedge themselves not always want to minimise risk (Working 1953). Consequently, he introduced a distinction between speculators and hedgers, as a criterion using only short-or middle-term storage of actual goods by the latter (Working 1962). The 1980s and 1990s brought the emergence of many descriptive models of markets that highlighted the role of technical analysis and its efficiency, which stemmed from the behaviour of investors who based their decision on information noise. J. L. Treynor and R. Ferguson concluded that achieving exceptional profits on the capital market is possible thanks to a combined analysis of past prices of assets and other valuable information. The authors, however, believe that such profits can be gained thanks to non-financial information, and past prices only make it possible to use this information efficiently (Treynor and Ferguson 1984, 1985). P. D. Brown and R. H. Jennings came to similar conclusions. They used a two-period dynamic model of equilibrium in order to demonstrate that rational investors use past prices of assets when formulating their expectations (Brown and Jennings 1989). The potential

The main topic of the present research is the decoy effect, which is the phenomenon in which the introduction of an irrelevant alternative (i.e. the decoy) in a choice set will significantly affect and change the probability shares of being selected of the items in the original choice set. The present study seeks to gain the first evidence concerning the ‘decoy-removal effect’ through an unconscious choice mechanism known as arbitrary coherence, through which it was possible to replicate the real life decision-making context in which the effect occurs. Moreover, the experiment has been designed in order to also test for discrepancies between the decoy effectiveness and the associated perceived satisfaction of the product assortment. The results suggest that there is indeed a difference in the effects of the decoy, when included in the original choice set, and the decoy removal, hence when removed from the choice set.

The dominant understanding of how motivations to contribute to public goods are generated and sustained is largely shaped by the combined action of rational choice theory and neoclassical economics.
This understanding relies on three key assumptions: individualism, instrumentalism and market equilibration. In this paper we question the theoretical consistency and empirical relevance of these assumptions and of their associated policy model. We argue that significant revision of this motivational theory is needed, one that takes into account intrinsic incentives, trust and strong reciprocity, as well as the effect of social constraints, money and market interactions on the propensity to contribute to public
goods. The paper concludes by outlining the implications of this theoretical reconsideration for the organization of scientific research and for more effective policy making to sustain motivations.

This paper presents a critical analysis of five articles pertaining to the subject matter of Rational Choice Theory (RCT). In the history of ideas, Rational Choice Theory came about the revival of an idealist oriented epistemology which gained its prominence by the end of the WWI. American academic circles then began to adopt values that challenged the principles of positivist and historicist disciplines. This was made with the intent of proving that the ideologies of rival powers, such as the Soviet Union (Marxism), were predicted to collapse (Seliktar, 2015: 9). Due to the changing nature of our world, rationalists were prompted to renew the postulates of RCT several times by drawing on experiences of new social and empirical conditions-often thriving to cutting-edge, yet ephemeral, conclusions. In this paper, we compare the views of prominent theorists and explore the evolving complexities of RCT through the lens of three particular themes: modes of rational agency, modes of quantification, and linear vs non-linear thinking.

Hofmeyr and Ross (forth.) have claimed that Stirling's conditional games, which model social influence, conceptually and technically generalise Bacharach's team reasoning when explaining cooperative and prosocial behaviour. I assess the relative generality of the team reasoning and of social influence approaches by systematically comparing with respect to various factors, and conclude that neither approach is likely to enjoy a higher degree of generality.

The present contribution examines the emergence of expected utility theory by John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern, the subjective the expected utility theory by Savage, and the problem of choice under risk and uncertainty, focusing in particular on the seminal work " The Utility Analysis of Choices involving Risk " (1948) by Milton Friedman and Leonard Savage to show how the evolution of the theory of choice has determined a separation of economics from psychology.