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POL 1004a Modern Political Analysis 1st essay

What are the assumptions of rational choice theory about how people make
decisions? Are they realistic? Does it matter if they are not?

Since the 1950s the rational choice theory (RCT) has become more and more
integrated in a lot of different social sciences (ex. economics, political science,
sociology etc.) as the core theory for explaining human behaviour. However, there are
questions arising such as 'can this theory validly explain all actions and, even more, all
social phenomena?' and if not, 'does it make a difference to the utilization of RCT is
social sciences, especially political science?'. RCT is defined as follows: 'instrumental
conception of individual rationality, by reference to which people are thought to
maximize their expected utilities in formally predictable ways.<...> rationality is
homogenous across the individuals under study' (Green and Shapiro, 1994, p. 17). It is
not a secret that our world is very complicated and that perfectly accurate prediction of
people behaviour is practically impossible. This led to quite a lot of criticism to the
applicability of RCT in social sciences.
To find out if people are usually behaving according to RCT, we need to understand
the process of rational choice itself. The process of rational choice was defined by F. E.
Oppenheim: 'To make the rational choice in a given situation, the actor must (1)
determine all alternative courses of action open to him; (2) predict the probable outcome
of each alternative action as best as he can on the basis of information available to him;
(3) establish a probabilistically weighted preference rank order among the alternative
possible outcomes in terms of some given standard of evaluation; (4) select the course
of action leading to the predicted outcome that corresponds to his highest preference.'
(Oppenheim, 1977, p. 280). It is then logical to assume that for RCT to be applicable, an
individual should follow this path of actions. One of the disputes between Brandt and
Oppenheim was on the topic of human benevolence. As Brandt stated and quoted Hume
that benevolence is a great part of every human and it is rational to be benevolent
(Brandt, 1977, p. 276), according to Oppenheim it may only be partially true as the

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person can have just a little bit of benevolence in his character, thus being charitable and
helpful, it is irrational to be benevolent (Oppenheim, 1977, p. 284). As we can notice, in
today's RCT approach benevolence is not a part of human nature in RCT, thus
supporting Oppenheim's point of view, however making RCT more inaccurate in
predicting human behaviour.
There are times when RCT is unable to predict human behaviour as RCT's
theoretical basis is limited to some particular situations and requirements of the status
quo. RCT can not be applied if any of the rational choice elements, provided by
Oppenheim, are invalid at the given time. For example Brandt states that rationality
excludes 'actions on impulse' because the person could not choose among all of the
possible alternative options and predict outcomes if he chose them instead of his desired
selection (Brandt, 1977, p. 271). This means that all actions that are made under the
influence of any emotion, for example love, hatred, fear, happiness cannot be explained
using RCT, which makes RCT less applicable to the explanation of the real world
situations. As the 3rd point of Oppenheim's definition is commonly taken as a fact and is
usually correct in the real world, it is the 4th point which has been probably criticised the
most. For example, Herrnstein explains that 'The weaknesses in rational choice theory
are uncovered by systematic inconsistencies in behaviour, which can sometimes be
graphically illustrated by asking people to solve riddles' (Herrnstein, 1990, p. 358). He
illustrates his statement with examples of people selecting irrationally in various
experiments and riddles, including selecting rewards (they falsely choose smaller bonus
earlier instead of waiting for a bigger bonus later) or choosing tactics in tennis (people
are tend to choose lob instead of the passing shot too often regardless the effectiveness
of their combination) (Herrnstein, 1990, pp. 358-361). One of the best known paradoxes
of RCT is the paradox of voting, which shows the flaws of RCT in both individual and
collective levels. It is always irrational for a person to vote, because the cost of voting is
always much higher than the reward (even the collective reward), which is the chance to
change the outcome of the voting. (Green and Shapiro, 1994, pp. 47-71), however, the
number of people who vote is usually higher than those, who don't vote, which might
lead to the conclusion that the greater part of the society is irrational (who would agree
to that?). Another part of the paradox is summarised by Riker and Ordeshook: 'Social

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decisions are not the same kind of think as individual decisions, even though the former
are constructed from the latter. <...> personal decisions follow from person's tastes, but
social decisions do not follow from the taste of society simply because it is never clear
what the taste of society is.' (Brams, 1976, p. 32). So in this case it gets too complicated
for a society to act rationaly. The example of two criminals, who can select between
testimony or silence, thus with different outcomes upon the selection are always acting
irrationally even if the decision is almost always rational for both of them individually
(Green and Shapiro, 1994, pp. 75-76). This means that RCT, which is sometimes unable
to predict human behaviour, should also be hardly effective in predicting the collective
behaviour.
If RCT has so many weaknesses, why it is still so popular? There are several
answers. First of all, according to Boudon, the attraction of RCT is its simplicity: 'once
we have explained that subject X has done Y rather than Y' because Y was more
advantageous, we need to know nothing more' (Boudon, 1998, p. 817). It is not
incorrect. For example, according to RCT if the person is offered to choose between,
let's say, £1 and £10, no strings attached, he would choose £10, because more money
equals more utility. According to Herrnstein, 'To argue against rationality as a
fundamental behavioural principle seems to be arguing against self-evident truth.'
(Herrnstein, 1990, p. 357). He continues by stating that RCT 'have formalized utility
maximization, reducing it to its axiomatic foundations' and it enabled theorists'
'powerful intellects shine most brightly, addressing questions of formal structure, not
distracted by the fuzziness of motivation or the messiness of data' (Herrnstein, 1990, p.
357). The best example of this is the usage of RCT's simplification in analysis of
institutions. According to Weingast, RCT allows tracking how institutions influence
outcomes and 'provides the technology for keeping track of many different parameters
simultaneously, thus affording testable propositions about how the results of political
interaction will vary with underlying circumstances'. It also 'provide the basis for a
conversation across the tradition boundaries within political science', thus enabling the
conversation between Americanists and comparativists (Weingast, 1996, pp. 174-175).
In addition to that, RCT proved to be useful as a guideline to thinking about crime
prevention and control. Cornish and Clarke state that 'a rational choice perspective on

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offending can suggest, if not explanations, lines of enquiry to account for stability and
change in criminal behavior.' (Cornish and Clarke, 1987, p. 944). This proves that RCT
is quite versitile and can be used in various fields from prediction of individual's
behaviour to crime prevention.
The biggest debates among social sciences theorists are about the usage of RCT – if
it is valid to use even if it is not the most accurate theory in the meaning of explaination
of human behaviour. On the one side, there are scholars, who believe that RCT can be
accepted as general theory for all social sciences. From the K. Arrow, who inspired this
RCT popularity in political science to almost radical promoter of RCT W. Riker, who
states that 'the use of rational choice theory accounts for the only genuine advances ever
to occur in political science.' (Green and Shapiro, 1994, p. 2) - all of them are trying to
prove that RCT is the core model of human behaviour analysis in social sciences,
especially political science. On the other side, there are scholars who neglect the
applicability of RCT in social sciences as the general theory. With probably the best
known book, which shows the weakest links in RCT through its lack of empirical
confirmations, Green and Shapiro become one of the biggest critiques of RCT. Even
being RCT's ally, Weingast gives credit to Green and Shapiro by writing in one of his
footnotes that 'No discussion about the rational choice approach is complete without
reference to Green and Shapiro's (1994) reccent critique' (Weingast, 1996, p. 185).
Other critiques like Boudon , who argues that 'RCT is not a general theory because it
uses a much too rigid and narrow conception of rationality' (Boudon, 1998, p. 821)
offer alternative conceptions of rationality, called cognitive rationality and axiological
rationality (Boudon, 1998, pp. 824-825), thus changing the core of RCT itself. As it was
not tested empirically, it is too risky to choose alternative modifications of RCT
provided by Boudon. However, there are scholars who say, that RCT, even if it may
look useless in predicting real life human behaviour, should be a core theory in social
sciences. One of them is Herrnstein, who states that 'The theory of rational choice fails
as a description of actual behavior, but it remains unequaled as a normative theory. It
tells us how we should behave in order to maximize reinforcement, not how we do
behave.' (Herrnstein, 1990, p. 356). Accepting RCT as only a theoretical approach,
which helps to greatly simplify application and empirical confirmation of other theories

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in social sciences, could be the most acceptable way and an optimal utilization of RCT
in social sciences, especially in political sciences. It may be similar to the approach of
perfect competition market in economical models – making theoretical work a lot
simplier and more empirical, even if perfect competition market is far from definition of
the real life market.
In conclusion, RCT may not be the most accurate theory of predicting human
behaviour, however, it is, at least for now, irreplaceable core theory, because simply
there is no other theory that can replace RCT in its place. It is the similar case like
democracy – it may not be the best government system, however, there is no better
system at the moment. As Herrnstein concludes, 'As old as it is, the idea (of rational
choice theory) remains unexplored and revolutionary, and it defines a conceptual
frontier that students of the experimental analysis of behavior are uniquely well
qualified to cross' (Herrnstein, 1990, p. 366). So the place of RCT can be summarised as
follows – as old as it is, as inaccurate in its assumptions of human behaviour as it is, as
empirically weak as it is, it is still the best core theory for social sciences at the
moment.

Bibliography:

Boudon R. (1998) 'Limitations of Rational Choice Theory' The American Journal of

Sociology, Vol. 104, No. 3, pp. 817-828

Brams S. (1976) Paradoxes in Politics. An Introduction to the Nonobvious in Political

Science. New York: The Free Press.

Brandt R. (1977) 'The Concept of Rationality in Ethical and Political Theory' in

Pennock J. & Chapman J. (ed) Human Nature in Politics. New York: New York
University Press, pp 265-279.

Cornish D. & Clarke R. (1987) 'Understanding Crime Displacement: an Application of

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Rational Choice Theory' Criminology. Vol. 25, No. 4, pp 933-947.

Green D. & Shapiro I. (1994) Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory. A Critique of

Applications in Political Science. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.

Herrnstein R. (1990) 'Rational Choice Theory. Rational but not Sufficient' American
Psychologist. Vol. 45, No. 3, pp. 356-367.

Oppenheim F.. (1977) 'Rationality and Egalitarianism' in Pennock J. & Chapman J. (ed)
Human Nature in Politics. New York: New York University Press, pp 280-285.

Weingast B. (1996) 'Political Institutions: Rational Choice Perspectives' in Goodin R. &

Klingemann H. A New Handbook of Political Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
pp. 167-190.

Student number: 600038731