HELP EDUCATE TROPERS OF ECONOMICS, THE FAIL BURNS
Ahr river
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH! I READ! I READ GOOD!
Read my stories!
DUMB
That's probably half the reason he's doing it at least.
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Vote is No
Introductions
Political science is barely a field of its own but we'll ignore that problem and instead celebrate it as a strength. There is a lot of internal diversity to the field and this often spawns nerdtastic fights and disagreements in the field.
You think Trek vs Star wars is intense? PAH! you want to see losers go at it get a hard core Rational Choice guy next to a Culturalist.
It's probably best to conceptualize this as follows:
- A hypothesis is a picture of a tree
- a theory is a picture of a forest
- a paradigm is a satellite picture of the planet
We're starting with the paradigms. To start I'll treat them as very seperate things but in honesty there's a good deal of mixing.
Culturalism
I will admit here and now that this is the paradigm I give the least personal credit to and have the least experience with. It draws heavily from Cultural Anthropology and strands of sociology. The underlying assumption of Culturalism is that human action is determined by culture.
To put things in experimental science terms: for all paradigms the Dependent Variable is Human Political Interaction. In Culturalism the Independent Variable is Culture. This does mean that since people are driven by culture all cultural development is organic and to a large degree inevitable.
Strengths:It's obvious that culture does have an impact, and cultural studies are FANTASTICALLY descriptive. They don't seek universality and often do a great job with explaining a small range of activity. It shouldn't be ignored that culture has an impact on politics and expectations. Nor can we deny that many degrees of culture are customary as compared to traditional.
to explain the pedantic difference: custom is just how people do things, it's uncodified and unenforced. Tradition is codified and enforced. Custom would be wearing the hometown jersey to a ball game. Tradition would be something like language.
Weaknesses:Here's where the critiques come in, and as I said I'm more likely to see these, so take out the salt bowl and pinch a grain.
Culture is a horrible unit of analysis, it is borderline impossible to define the limits of one culture. As such any work done using culture will be contested on those grounds alone.
Cultural theories are hard to model. They don't seek universality so they don't look to make a model that can be applied to other cases.
Cultural theories are hard to falsify. A good theory can be constructed in a way that it can be tested and shown to survive falsifiability but cultural studies are very poor at doing so. There are a few reasons for this, one of which is the aforementioned modeling problems, another is the difficulty of quantifying cultural studies and findings.
Cultures are sometimes created and artificial. This will come up a lot in the nationalism readings. But Elites will often attempt to shape culture to their will with varying degrees of success. This would make Culture the dependent variable of elite action.
Thoughts:Culture shouldn't be ignored and any good social science should learn the mechanics of cultural studies, it is a variable but to me it isn't sufficient. It's hard to make scientific, it's difficult to prove anything with it, and there are core conceptual problems.
Structuralism
This is by far the largest paradigm in political Science. It seeks to explain human interaction through the type and nature of the structures in society. It should be noted that for this case structures can be real and formal or informal social groupings. Political institutions count as structures, so the sorts of electoral laws would be included. Social structures would be things like ethnic communities, or most commonly class.
Modern Political Science is indeed rooted in the study of political institutions and the law, this genesis shows up quite often and with good reason. Laws and institutions do effect actions.
Strengths: Structures are often well defined.
I have to say often because social structures are poorly defined especially as a time series. Classes have changed meanings classifications and interests overtime. The working class of 100 years ago is very different from the modern working class, and indeed modern classes are defined less on earning lines and more on the lines of what type of work is done and in what region/community.
However there is a lot of history to use for Institutional studies. If you want to study the effects of given institutions on human interaction data can be mined going back to the origin of language. If a trend can be found from Ur to LA it would have fantastic strength.
Weaknesses:Predictive ability. It used to be assumed that institutions alone dictated politics, and so if you put a British Parlimentary system into Ghana their politics would be like the UK's. This didn't happen, pretty much at all. There are a lot of reasons for this. Culture, differences in the internal pressures, differences in leadership at foundation, legitimacy of institutions etc.
It should also be noted that Structuralism cannot on its own explain the genesis of Political Institutions
Rational Choice
I'll admit up front I'm a rational choice guy. I'm better at it, I like it and it's similar to Economics so I feel comfortable with it. So get a second grain of salt ready.
Rational choice is based on the theory of self interested rational actors. This means that you assume people have ordinal preferences that they seek to maximize the fulfillment of at the minimum of cost.
It tends to focus on the actions of leaders and elites usually because their actions are the most easy to examine, and their motivations the best recorded.
Strengths: It makes for easy models that can be tested against other cases, and falsified with ease. Most models created here can be universalized as well.
Fairly empirical and can deal well with the genesis of cultures and institutions, they were created or changed to suit the desires of those shaping them.
Often very predictive.
Weaknesses Common assumption of material Rationality
Collective action problem.
If you guys don't know what those are I'll explain them.
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It used to be assumed that institutions alone dictated politics, and so if you put a British Parlimentary system into Ghana their politics would be like the UK's. This didn't happen, pretty much at all. There are a lot of reasons for this. Culture, differences in the internal pressures, differences in leadership at foundation, legitimacy of institutions etc. So... use a combination of the three?
DUMB
What's the collective action problem?
And wouldn't any of this such model have major problems with predictive power? Just because of the sheer number of variables.
But Elites will often attempt to shape culture to their will with varying degrees of success.Does «Elite» have some specific jargony definition, or does it just work in the colloquial sense?
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Vote is No
@Mellon: It's really hard to combine the 3 but generally speaking it gets done to some degree.
Rational Choice would say: Culture and institutions change the cost benefit matrix for actors and create new costs and benefits.
However the core assumptions of Rational Choice and culture are very hard to mix, culture often assumes irrationality and that people accept culture purely as is. Rational choice assumes people use culture when they want to, but that it does have some effects on perception.
Rational Choice and structure blend easily though because it's clear that there's a ton of interaction between them since structures create avenues for choice.
Tzetze:
Collective Action Problem: Also referred to as the free rider paradox. Theoretically in any large group of people the incentive would be to free ride on group activities. So if your entire campus wants you all to go out and help do X most people won't. The reason is there are too many of you to enforce the rule effectively so the incentive is to do nothing and let other people pick up the slack.
The implications are:
- no one should vote
- no social movement should function
- Tragedy of the commons should be a universal law
And yet ~60% of the population votes, social movements function, and the tragedy of the commons has been averted. There are ways around this which actually feeds into your predictive question.
Rational choice can model and predict by simplifying. You assume people want things like money and power. Therefore prediction #1 is that when possible people will seek to maximize these things.
The political institutions are FPTP SMD (first past the post Single member district) so the incentive is to not be in or vote for a 3rd party because you can only get representation by winning the district.
Prediction: Politicians will work themselves into one of the two major parties, which ever is closest to their preferences.
Etc. You can't make super precise predictions, but for your model to hold up it should be able to be applied to similar situations and hold up. When creating a theory you make a general prediction or trend, when doing a case study you can be more specific.
Edit:
Elite just means elite the people with power, since it changes depending on social and institutional structure when I'm being general I'll use the term.
edited 30th Nov '10 6:58:24 PM by MEPT72
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DUMB
Interesting... I think my automatic reaction to the free rider problem was decidedly non-rationalist, though. 
Vote is No
There are ways to explain free rider away, and account for when people will act in defiance to it but it reduces predictive ability.
It should be noted that free rider and CAP happen A LOT though they're just not universal.
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DUMB
Yeah, I can imagine. That seems like it's a game theoretic problem, even.
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Vote is No
It is, you can get that complex when dealing with an individual because you can find their preferences. If trying to predict for all people you tend to simplify down to material if you want concert predictions, more complex if you want trends or explanatory theories. I'll get to this a lot with Nationalism and its Logical Foundations because basically that's what the book is about.
I also know the author.
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Vote is No
Well since I'm in the writing mood I'll continue on.
Neo-classical Economics
This is a case where it's hard to find the right balance point. This is an entire field of study. Basically it dominated modern Economics. I'll be brief here just because if I start going into detail we'll be at it for ever.
Assumes Materially self interested rational actors. People will try to maximize wealth at the minimum expense.
Believes that knowledge is diffuse. This is more of a second order conclusion (built on findings and other assumptions) but a crucial one. Basically the belief is that knowledge is diffuse through out the population, and that it's very hard for small groups of very smart people to account for the interests and incentives of all people.
Mutual exchange: since people are self interested and rational they won't make a deal that doesn't benefit them. This means that any sale both participants win.
Price is reflective not exploitative: due to the pressures of supply and demand and competition prices are a reflective mechanism of: Cost of production scarcity of resources needed and demand for product.
Market distortions are generally bad: since the market will find its equilibrium through price mechanisms anything that artificially creates low or high prices is bad, it'll create either shortage or surplus.
The implications and beliefs are that the market is generally speaking efficient, it will go up and down but will self correct and grow overtime. Any planning is a very dangerous proposition as the possible negative effects due to path dependency* are potentially crippling.
As such the recommendations are usually towards free markets as the way to reach Pareto Optimality (the point where in society nothing can be gained without equal loss)this isn't a 100% anarcho capitalist position though.
For good markets there needs to be trust and certainty. Property rights must be clear and the rules of the game so to speak stable. Infrastructure can reduce transaction costs, as can reporting laws and technology. Fraud laws, weights and measures, must be clear and stable.
It should be pointed out that even at the Libertarian end of this there is still support for welfare if the goal of the welfare system is to prevent people from starving, not to eliminate inequality or provide a happy fruitful life (incentives and such).
As such the role of the state is seen as an umpire, it should make rules and allow as much free competition as possible. The rules should be clearly stated and evenly enforced.
*Path Dependency: Sometimes irrational unprofitable institutions persist because even though they're damaging the immediate cost of undoing them is greater than the immediate benefit. This means that even if Department of X is bad there would bee too much political capital needed to undo it, and that it would create a massive short term market distortion.
edited 30th Nov '10 7:30:28 PM by MEPT72
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Assumes Materially self interested rational actors. People will try to maximize wealth at the minimum expense. I thought it was just "maximize utility"? Because then you can take into account stuff like utility curves that decrease over time.
since the market will find its equilibrium through price mechanisms anything that artificially creates low or high prices is bad, it'll create either shortage or surplus. What about stuff like externalities? In that case isn't it that shortage/surplus are better than the current equilibrium? Not the most efficient, but relatively better.
For good markets there needs to be trust and certainty. Property rights must be clear and the rules of the game so to speak stable. Infrastructure can reduce transaction costs, as can reporting laws and technology. Fraud laws, weights and measures, must be clear and stable. Heh, I know there's a Poli Sci school of thought that claims that government came into existence pretty much to serve the capitalists. *
edited 30th Nov '10 7:55:09 PM by melloncollie
Vote is No
Utility would be a more accurate term, I was trying to keep jargon down.
The theory is that for externalities they should be enforced by the state via price mechanisms.
"The state has a role to step in when property rights are diffuse and unclear" - Friedman
So the state should make the externality producing firm pay the cost placed on society.
Just to be clear:
I'm being intentionally brief on Neo-Classical Economics because several subjects are about how they differ from it, but very little will use it purely and I didn't feel like bogging things down with too much. Now if you have any questions I don't mind discussing it at all here.
A second reminder is that what ever you read in this thread isn't my thoughts, so if a theory I give out sounds despicable to you don't blame me I'm just the messenger.
edited 1st Dec '10 11:13:33 AM by MEPT72
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Vote is No
On to Social Economics.
I'll be honest here my experience with this field as a whole is limited as it's a part of Sociology. The general theory of the field is that Economies and markets must be viewed in the context of the social and cultural structures around them. It seeks descriptive and explanatory only eschewing simplifications that would allow for predictive ability. This means if you want an explanation of why the Industrial Revolution happened in England they'll be able to provide a very good explanation. If you want them to model the next five years they won't be able to.
This is essentially the biggest difference between Social and Neo-Classical Economics.
One of the classics in the field is Karl Polyani's The Great Transformation. I'm going to start off first with a contradictory statement: the theory this book puts forward is a good one, the scholarship of this book is at times awful.
In many ways Polyani was writing a response and critique to Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations The problem is that in all honesty I'm pretty convinced he never read Adam Smith, especially not Theory of Moral Sentiments. He also had very little familiarity with the mechanics of economic theory.
Oddly enough this doesn't damage the core of his theory. It does damage some of the extensions of it and some of his work. An example of his failure to read Adam Smith: the core complaint he has of Smith and classic economics is that they ignore that people also care about things like social status and respect from their peers. A large part of Theory of Moral Sentiments is that people care deeply about being loved and respected by their peers. An example of not knowing economics well is that he proposes that material self interest is new because back in the days of Rome for example people didn't try to work extra hours to pick up extra money. The reason for this can be very easily explained in economics. Namely that the marginal increase to utility (think happiness) from an extra dollar was much lower back in the day because no matter how expensive we think things are now, it cost more back then, and there was less to get. Keep in mind the differences in the types of material goods available as well.
That aside the core of Polyani's theory is that Liberal Market configurations create socially disruptive shocks, jobs are changed and moved lifestyles changed technology revolutionizes order and social tradition change. Therefore to protect itself against change society preforms a double move (creating markets and protecting themselves against them). This would be why Capitalism has been tempered so much since its introduction, why there's protectionism, unions, welfare etc.
As I said the core of his theory: Society will protect itself from markets while at the same time introducing them, is left untouched by some of the faults I pointed out, they did make the reading painful for me. There is a lot more to this field.
If anyone's wondering this theory would be a form of combination between Structure Culture and Rational Choice. Structure because it examines the social structures that protect themselves, the formation of markets as structures embedded in society and the institutions and social organizations created to protect against the ravages of the free market. Rational Choice because it explains why it makes sense for people to do these things (not a ton of this though). Culture because it examines the cultures that created free markets and the effects of markets on culture. Predominantly though it is structural.
A more Cultural perspective would be from Landes who promoted the Weberian idea that Protestantism was superior for development of wealth. He continued on as why this would be and made an entirely cultural argument. For example he said the catholic propensity for grandiosity and gambling doomed the Spanish Kingdom.
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ALMSIVI
An example of not knowing economics well is that he proposes that material self interest is new because back in the days of Rome for example people didn't try to work extra hours to pick up extra money. The reason for this can be very easily explained in economics. Namely that the marginal increase to utility (think happiness) from an extra dollar was much lower back in the day because no matter how expensive we think things are now, it cost more back then, and there was less to get. Keep in mind the differences in the types of material goods available as well.This is incredibly interesting to me, but I'm not entirely sure I get it. Could you perhaps explain it in more detail?
Also, you keep using the word "utility", and I'm only marginally sure of what it means in this context. While I could look it up myself, I was hoping that you wouldn't mind defining it.
"I can't imagine what Hell will have in store, but I know when I'm there, I won't wander anymore."
Vote is No
In economics utility means something good to the person acting. I used wealth before but that's insufficient. The quickest way to think of Utility is as happiness. A utility maximizing person seeks to maximize how happy or "good" their life is to their measure of it. Every person has different preferences Material and non Material. And indeed for some people a large part of utility might be living to a certain moral or social code.
Due to the difficulty of quantifying that utility in Economics is often reduced (for predictive models) to material wealth and benefit, it generally works fairly well but when presented with some cases it has to be expanded. Generally speaking it is assumed that people are to some degree lazy and gain utility by simply not working. Therefore you'll work to the point that the utility you gain from work benefits is equal or lesser than the utility of the next best option, even if that option is sitting on your ass and doing nothing.
What I meant about Rome was: (and this is all in context of Economic Theory I'm just trying to show why it's an invalid criticism of economics since it works within the field, it doesn't mean that the implication that the Industrial/Capital revolution changed the nature of society, but that's not the point Polyani made) Before production was cheap and common any luxury item was very expensive. The other thing to keep in mind is that the pleasure derived from luxury items was generally smaller, indeed if you look at the sort of things available before the industrial revolution there were less toys or pure fun items for people to buy they were generally either very expensive, or something that could be made by a lay person (simple game boards etc).
If someone wanted to maximize utility they were best off to work as few hours as would sustain them and perhaps pay for a bit of socialization as almost all fun and luxury occurred from social interaction. So if we're using Rome as an example, the ideal would be to work just enough for basic domestic maintenance, food, and a bit of extra wine to drink with your friends, or food for a party. There was less incentive to work extra hours to buy a new TV new Stereo, or even travel as vacation was usually prohibitively expensive and out of the means of all but the ultra rich.
Where as now there's much more utility available from monetary goods. Stuff is cheaper and a greater variety is available. Now this does play into the argument Polyani made about social dislocations caused by the economic revolution he just poorly phrased that critique of Classical/Neo-Classical Economics.
When we get to Iron Law of Oligarchy we'll run into another clear case of making scholarly mistakes and still being right. It should be noted that both books are classics in their field despite some scholarship or theoretical errors because the good parts of the theory outweigh the bad.
Later tonight I'm going to post introductions to Nationalism I kinda expect debate to pick up here and hope it does. I'll admit I'm not a Nationalism scholar, but I am learning from one, and have done a decent amount of scholarly work on it this semester. I will cite and reference a few books I haven't read yet, but I'll let you know what they are, I'll be going off of the interpretation my professor gave. If and when I get to them on my own I might have a slightly different reading.
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As such the recommendations are usually towards free markets as the way to reach Pareto Optimality (the point where in society nothing can be gained without equal loss)this isn't a 100% anarcho capitalist position though.
I'm A Dirty Cowboy
This is very interesting information.
Re: the first post.
Why isn't Culturalism subsumed under Structuralism? Aren't cultures/sub-cultures structural entities?
Like, Goths tend to shop at Hot Topic. This is both a cultural observation and an observation on how structures interact. Right?
I don't know, I get the feeling I'm not understanding properly.
How much have I got hopelessly wrong?
Vote is No
@Noimporta: thats a subject for debate, basically the question is which causes more disruption to market equilibrium? the problem or the cure. Some would argue that true monopolies are rare with out government support, others would argue that since competition is what's important you need anti trust law.
@mmys: It's a difference in how they perceive of culture. If you view cultural groups or ethnicities as social structures then you're a structuralist because these groups will act and interact in given ways.
If you view the members as driven to their actions by culture itself then you're using a culturalist assumption. For example New England culture MAKES me a Red Sox fan is culturalist.
Pure culturalists are pretty rare in political science because there's a lot of problems with the paradigm, probably more than the others, and it's fairly inflexible. At the same time cultural studies (as well as behavioral) have taken a larger role in Rational Choice and Structural theories. But in this case culture is viewed as an influence or intermediate variable not as the dominant independent variable.
A good example of the difference will probably be tomorrow when I get to Anthony Smith's antiquity of nations which is 90% cultural 7% structure and 3% rational choice (and that's being generous giving it 3% rational choice).
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Vote is No
Okay on to Nationalism. This is kinda a sticky subject mostly due to the way people define nationalism. Simply put nationalism isn't thinking the country you live in is the best or just generally awesome. That can be a symptom of nationalism but isn't actually nationalism.
Nationalism is the belief that you are a part of a nation. A Nation is a culturally united group, often along ethnic lines, further, this concept of nation is usually organic. Each member is a part of the whole, no more divorcable from it as the liver is from the human body. To illustrate each step well create a cultural group, the MEP Tarians. For there to be MEP Tarian nationals they have to believe that there is a whole that's unique and separate enough from other cultural groups.
I've been avoiding using the word but I'm going to get into it now, ethnicity simply means cultural group. An ethnicity can be multi-racial, and an individual race can be multi-ethnic.
So the second part of nationalism is the belief that your 'nation' deserves to be self ruled. Usually by some sort of representative means, but if nothing else you want a MEPT nation for the MEP Tarians! You either want to overthrow what you perceive to be an illegitimate or foreign power that's ruling your national territory or separate from a larger body.
Now because people tend to think in terms of group identity and superiority, a common side effect is the belief that your nation is the best one.
The question is how are nations defined? this is where I'm going to get into books I haven't read. The first is Benedict Anderson's Imagined Communities if you're in the study of nationalism this is the book you have to include in your literature review, love it or hate it it's that influential. The thesis of the book is that all national identities are imagined, created, and artificial. There is no MEPT nation you fools you've been duped by the cultural elites.
A second that should be understood because it explains the process, is Gramsci's Hegemony which is about the process of cultural domination. The phrase hegemony originally referred to culture not international politics. An idea became hegemonic once it was common sense. Basically nationalism as Anderson defines it is a hegemonic identity. People don't question their national ID and the thought of doing so seems unnatural.
The next book post forward a different genesis for National Identity, but I'll get to it tomorrow, I think I'll do one "lesson" post a day to give people a chance to question. But, if we accept even a piece of Anderson's thesis that National Identities are created, the question is how? the theory is that identities are created most often in terms of what we are not, as compared to what we are. This allows or an expansive definition but a meaningful one. The balancing act of defining a group is including as many people as possible, but having boundaries clear enough that the group has meaning. This process of othering is a fuel for national animosities.
Now it should be noted that someone can:
- dislike another group
- think where they live is the best place on earth
- support militaristic action
With out being nationalistic. You can be patriotic, jingoistic or xenophobic without believing you belong to a nation. The problem with a purely cultural understanding of nation is finding the boundaries. For example Joel Garreau posited that there are 9 nations in north america because there are 9 distinct cultural groups.
If these cultural groups are aware of the differences they won't be nationalistic towards their state but instead to their group. An example of this would be someone with "southern pride". They think that there are distinct cultural differences in the American Cultures and has pride in their's. They can still be patriotic to the state that houses their cultural group but they're not being nationalist in their support.
Generally speaking though, something is a "nation" if most people in it feel it is, that there's some binding cultural glue. I know I've been a pain before arguing that America might not be a nation, and I think there's some truth to that, but if most people consider themselves part of an american identity the differences in culture don't matter they're a part of an American Nation. I just like to nit pick.
Now we've got 3 books on this subject Antiquity of Nations is a primarily cultural argument. Colonial Effect is a mostly structural argument, and Nationalism and its Logical Foundations is a Rational Choice argument, also was written by my professor.
Depending on how many questions you guys have I might extend this subject out for an extra day with a recap if certain questions get repeated.
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Doesn't seem like there's much to distinguish national sentiment from identity politics more generally. Intrinsically rooted identities are common, but synthetic identities certainly aren't uncommon.
edited 3rd Dec '10 6:01:04 PM by Nornagest
I will keep my soul in a place out of sight, Far off, where the pulse of it is not heard.
I'm A Dirty Cowboy
How does nationalism reconcile with multicultural countries, e.g. Britain, Holland (to an extent)?
For instance, a key part of being British as I understand it is a commitment to honouring the cultures of others within the same country.
How then could British Nationalism manifest? Does this mean that the British National Party are mistaken not only in their morals and goals, but also in their conception of what they represent?
edited 3rd Dec '10 6:03:56 PM by mmysqueeant
So I'm mostly doing this to give myself an exercise to help learn the theories. I do however hope to be a professor and am hoping for some of you people to be my guinea pigs though and help me work on making some of these ideas clear.
Most of what will be done here is very theoretical though, and I will admit upfront that since I don't have a TV to watch the News my knowledge of current events is limited. I'm also not here to really get into my personal beliefs on public policy but instead to try to outline overarching theories, smaller theories and a few classics of political science that I've read either in undergrad or post grad.
Any questions you have feel free to ask here, if a dialog gets really fine detail I might just PM you to keep natter out of the thread (I actually hope this happens because it means people are reading and thinking).
My plan is as follows:
Hope you guys stick around enough that I feel motivation to go on with this. These posts will be a bit of work for me so if you're reading and want me to continue post something so I know. This will be very informal because I'm not writing a paper just trying to gather my notes and thoughts and inform you people.
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