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Rationality and Commitment


Description: Thirteen leading philosophers and economists discuss the Nobel Laureate Amartya Sens trenchant critique of rational choice theory, and propose their own answers to the question of how to account for the rationality of committed action. The volume concludes with a specially-written reply by Sen.

Rational choice theory forms the core of the economic approach to human behaviour. It is also the most influential philosophical account of practical rationality. Yet there are persistent controversies about the scope of rational choice theory in philosophy and, increasingly, in economics as well. A leading critic is the philosopher and Nobel Laureate economist Amartya Sen, who put forward a trenchant critique of rational choice theory in his seminal paper Rational Fools. Sen emphasizes the importance of commitment - those aspects of human behavior which dispose individuals to co-operate, follow norms, and identify with others. He argues that rational choice theory cannot accommodate commitment, and demands a more adequate account of rationality.

The question of how to account for the rationality of commitment is very much an open issue and, if anything, even more pressing today than when Sen first raised it. In Rationality and Commitment, thirteen leading philosophers and economists discuss Sens claims and propose their own answers to the question of how to account for the rationality of committed action. The volume concludes with a specially-written reply by Sen, in which he responds to his critics and provides a rich commentary on the preceding essays.

About the Author
Fabienne Peter is an Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Warwick. Hans Bernhard Schmid is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Basel.


Contents: List of Figures, Schemata, and Tables
List of Contributors
Acknowledgments

Introduction

Rational Fools, Rational Commitments
Fabienne Peter and Hans Bernhard Schmid

Part I. Committed Action

1. Why Exactly is Commitment Important for Rationality?
Amartya Sen

2. Construing Sen on Commitment
Philip Pettit

3. Sympathy, Commitment, and Preference
Daniel M. Hausman

Part II. Rethinking Rationality

4. Instrumental Rationality versus Practical Reason: Desires, Ends, and Commitment
Herlinde Pauer-Studer

5. The Grammar of Rationality
Geoffrey Brennan

6. The Rationality of Rational Fools: The Role of Commitments, Persons, and Agents in Rational Choice Modelling
Werner G¨uth and Hartmut Kliemt

7. Rational Self-Commitment
Bruno Verbeek

8. Rationality and Commitment in Voluntary Cooperation: Insights from Experimental Economics
Simon G¨achter and Christian Th¨oni

Part III. Commitment, Intentions, and Identity

9. Beyond Self-Goal Choice: Amartya Sen’s Analysis of the Structure of Commitment and the Role of Shared Desires
Hans Bernhard Schmid

10. Cooperation and the We-Perspective
Raimo Tuomela

11. Collective Intentions, Commitment, and Collective Action
Problems
Margaret Gilbert

12. Theories of Team Agency
Natalie Gold and Robert Sugden

13. Identity and Commitment: Sen’s Fourth Aspect of the Self
John B. Davis

Comment

Rational Choice: Discipline, Brand Name, and Substance
Amartya Sen

Index

List of Figures, Schemata, and Tables

Figures
3.1 Prisoner’s Dilemma; game form
3.2 Prisoner’s Dilemma; game
3.3 Prisoner’s Dilemma; game form
6.1 The simple trust game
6.2 Relative and absolute commitments
6.3 Take it or leave it in strategic form
6.4 Take it or leave it in extensive form
6.5 Modified take it or leave it game
6.6 An embedded battle of the sexes
6.7 Sequential Prisoner’s Dilemma
6.8 Strategic form of sequential Prisoner’s Dilemma
6.9 Standard Prisoner’s Dilemma with power to commit to strategies as programmes
7.1 Decision tree
8.1 The Prisoner’s Dilemma game
8.2 Average contribution function of types freerider, conditional cooperator, triangle contributor, and ‘others’
8.3 Average actual contributions and predicted contributions
8.4 Average contributions over ten periods
8.5 Cooperation patterns in the absence and presence of punishment
10.1 Collective good dilemma
10.2 Prisoner’s Dilemma
12.1 The Prisoner’s Dilemma
12.2 Hi-Lo
12.3 A Prisoner’s Dilemma with transformed payoffs
12.4 Hawk-Dove

Schemata
12.1 Individual rationality
12.2 Collective rationality
12.3 Simple team reasoning (from a group viewpoint)
12.4 Simple team reasoning (from an individual viewpoint)
12.5 Restricted team reasoning
12.6 Circumspect team reasoning
12.7 Mutually assured team reasoning

Tables
6.1 Rational choice as maximization and non-maximization
8.1 Overview of the distribution of types in Prisoner’s Dilemma games and Public Goods games




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