What's Wrong with Social Norms? An Alternative to Elster's Theory

1997 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 339-360
Author(s):  
Frans van Zetten
Keyword(s):  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Norms ◽  
Wage Bargaining ◽  
The Self ◽  
Equal Pay ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
Collective Wage Bargaining ◽  
Equal Work

Is guidance by social norms compatible with rationality? Jon Elster has argued inThe Cement of Societythat there is a fundamental contrast between rationality and conformity to social norms. The context of study is the problem of collective action, with special emphasis on collective wage bargaining. In such negotiations, the appeal to social norms rather than to self-interest can block agreement. Suppose one union is committed to the norm of equal pay for equal work; another one appeals to the norm of equal pay for everybody, regardless of the type of work. ‘In the presence of competing norms that favor different groups, the self-righteousness conferred by belief in a norm can lead to a bargaining impasse.'In confrontations between individuals, codes of honor can produce similar problems. It is in no one's interest to face a colleague over the barrel of a gun because one has made a nasty remark about his latest book, but if the code demands that one fight it out, the challenge must be accepted.

Collective Action by Physicians: Beyond Strikes

2000 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 498-503 ◽  
Author(s):  
SUSAN DORR GOOLD
Keyword(s):  
Collective Action ◽  
Patient Care ◽  
House Officer ◽  
The Self ◽  
Middle Classes ◽  
Airline Pilots ◽  
The Past ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
Common Goals

“Collective action” usually brings to mind images of picket signs held by laborers striking for better wages and benefits. Collective action, however, need not be limited to the withholding of labor. Nor need it involve only the working or middle classes, as airline pilots have recently demonstrated. Finally, collective action need not have as its only purpose the self-interest of the group. Collective action does, however, always involve a joining together of individuals united by common goals or interests in order to consolidate power for the purpose of negotiating with another group or entity. Examples of collective action obviously include striking, other withholding labor actions, and slowdowns, but can also include many other activities. “Paper strikes,” for example, have been threatened or used by house officer organizations in the past. In a paper strike, patient care continues but without documentation, and thus, the institution suffers from absent or delayed financial remuneration.

What Makes Rational Peasants Revolutionary? Dilemma, Paradox, and Irony in Peasant Collective Action

1994 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 383-418 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark I. Lichbach
Keyword(s):  
Collective Action ◽  
The Self ◽  
Political Struggle ◽  
Collective Action Problem ◽  
Demand And Supply ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
Questions And Answers ◽  
Selective Incentives ◽  
Peasant Resistance ◽  
Peasant Organizations

Peasant upheavals are studied from the perspective offered by the selective incentives solution to Olson's collective action problem. This article presents much evidence from three different forms of peasant struggles—everyday forms of peasant resistance, unorganized rural movements, and organized peasant rebellions—that demonstrates the widespread existence of selective incentives. Questions about the causes and consequences of selective incentives are then examined. First, what are the conditions under which peasant struggles emphasize material selective incentives rather than nonmaterial altruistic appeals? The level of selective incentives in any peasant upheaval is a function of demand and supply considerations. Peasants demand selective incentives. The suppliers include one or more dissident peasant organizations, the authorities, and the allies of both. A political struggle ensues as the suppliers compete and attempt to monopolize the market. Second, what are the conditions under which the pursuit of material self-interest hurts rather than helps the peasantry's collective cause? Selective incentives supplemented by ideology can be effective; selective incentives alone are counterproductive.These questions and answers lead to the conclusion that the selective incentives solution reveals much more about peasant upheavals than simply that peasants will often be concerned with their own material self-interest. It is therefore important to study the following three aspects of peasant collective action: the dilemma peasants face, or how peasant resistance is in the interest of all peasants but in the self-interest of none; the paradox peasants face, or that rational peasants do solve their dilemma (for example, with selective incentives) and participate in collective action; and the irony peasants face, or that self-interest is both at the root of their dilemma and at the foundation of a solution to their paradox.

„Rzymski” Żyd – nieznana twórczość Romana Brandstaettera

2012 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-61
Author(s):  
Dariusz Konrad Sikorski
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Social Norms ◽  
Cultural Values ◽  
Interwar Period ◽  
Free Speech ◽  
Role Model ◽  
The Self ◽  
Polish Literature ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The Law

Summary After 1946, ie. after embracing Christianity, Roman Brandstaetter would often point to the Biblical Jonah as a role model for both his life and his artistic endeavour. In the interwar period, when he was a columnist of Nowy Głos, a New York Polish-Jewish periodical, he used the penname Romanus. The ‘Roman’ Jew appears to have treated his columns as a form of an artistic and civic ‘investigation’ into scandalous cases of breaking the law, destruction of cultural values and violation of social norms. Although it his was hardly ‘a new voice’ with the potential to change the course of history, he did become an intransigent defender of free speech. Brought up on the Bible and the best traditions of Polish literature and culture, Brandstaetter, the self-appointed disciple of Adam Mickiewicz, could not but stand up to the challenge of anti-Semitic aggression.

Two Feminist Views on the Self, Identity and Collective Action

Hypatia ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 120-125
Author(s):  
Margaret A. McLaren
Keyword(s):  
Collective Action ◽  
The Self ◽  
Self Identity

Levels and types of breaking the maxims: A neo-Gricean account of humor

2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Attila L. Nemesi
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
The Self ◽  
Social Psychological ◽  
Cooperative Principle ◽  
Pragmatic Theory ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
Constant Tension

AbstractOn the basis of examples drawn from seven classic Hungarian film comedies, I argue in this article that the place of humor within the Gricean–Leechian model needs to be revisited and extended towards social psychological pragmatics to account for a wider range of humorous material. Scrutinizing the relevant controversial details of Grice’s conceptual framework, my concern is to find a practical way of fitting the various forms of humor into an adequate (and not an idealistic) pragmatic theory. I propose to differentiate between two levels and five types of breaking the maxims, introducing the Self-interest Principle (SiP) supposed to be in constant tension with, and as rational as, Grice’s Cooperative Principle. Politeness and self-presentational phenomena are subsumed under the operation of the SiP which embraces and coordinates the speaker’s own personal and interpersonal purposes.

Sex Differences in Reward Allocation

1988 ◽  
Vol 67 (3) ◽  
pp. 981-982
Author(s):  
Kerry C. Martin ◽  
Jay Hewitt
Keyword(s):  
Sex Differences ◽  
Work Groups ◽  
The Self ◽  
The Other ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
High Productivity ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
Reward Allocation

Men and women were presented descriptions of two dyadic work groups. In both groups, one member of the dyad did approximately two-thirds of the work. For one of the groups, subjects were asked to imagine that they were the worker of high productivity while for the other group subjects were asked to imagine that they were impartial observers. Subjects were asked to divide the rewards among the two workers for both groups. Men and women did not differ in allocation of reward when acting as impartial observers. When subjects imagined themselves as the worker of high productivity, men gave themselves a greater share of the reward than did women. It was concluded that the results were consistent with the self-interest explanation of sex differences in allocation of reward.

Sentiment and Prejudice

2021 ◽  
pp. 799-832
Author(s):  
Cléo Chassonnery-Zaïgouche ◽  
Annie L. Cot
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Presidential Address ◽  
Women's Work ◽  
British Association ◽  
Equal Pay ◽  
Women’S Work ◽  
Women's Wages ◽  
Equal Work ◽  
Economic Journal

This article describes the evolution of Edgeworth’s thought on women’s wages and on the principle of “equal pay for equal work.” We first document Edgeworth’s early works on “exact utilitarianism” as an epistemic basis for his reflections upon women’s wages. Second, we review his first writings on women’s work and wages: early mentions in the 1870s, his book reviews published in the Economic Journal, and the substantial preface he wrote for the British Association for the Advancement of Science 1904 report on Women in Printing Trades. Third, we document his 1922 British Association presidential address in relation to the burgeoning literature on women’s work and wages within political economy at the time. Finally, we show that his 1923 follow-up article on women’s wages and economic welfare constitutes an update of his “aristocratical utilitarianism” in the post–World War I context.

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