ש Rational Irrationality: Political Positions as Poses-- Huemer and Caplan. Michael Huemer's "Why People Are Irrational about Politics" makes the good (though not new) point that a voter's political position is often driven by his desire to be seen as holding that position rather than by the policies he desires to see in place. Mark Ramseyer and I apply that idea to legislators in ``Cheap Bribes and the Corruption Ban: a Coordination Game Among Rational Legislators,'' Public Choice (1994) 78: 305-327. Bryan Caplan of George Mason has a bunch of articles on this theme too. The outcome can be perverse-- everybody can end up voting for Policy X while quietly praying that X will be stopped--- but by someone else. The idea can explain a lot about political behavior. Here is Professor Huemer's exposition of it.
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The theory of Rational Irrationality makes two main assumptions. First,
individuals have non-epistemic belief preferences (otherwise known as "biases"). That
is, there are certain things that people want to believe, for reasons independent of the
truth of those propositions or of how well-supported they are by the evidence. Second,
individuals can exercise some control over their beliefs. Given the first assumption,
there is a "cost" to thinking rationally--namely, that one may not get to believe the
things one wants to believe. Given the second assumption (and given that individuals are
usually instrumentally rational), most people will accept this cost only if they receive
greater benefits from thinking rationally. But since individuals receive almost none of
the benefit from being epistemically rational about political issues, we can predict
that people will often choose to be epistemically irrational about political issues.
The theory of Rational Irrationality holds that it is often instrumentally rational to
be epistemically irrational. In more colloquial (but less accurate) terms: people often
think illogically because it is in their interests to do so. This is particularly common
for political beliefs. Consider one of Caplan�s examples. If I believe, irrationally,
that immigrants are no good at running convenience marts, I bear the costs of this
belief--e.g., I may wind up paying more or traveling farther for goods I want. But if I
believe--also irrationally--that immigrants are harming the American economy in general,
I bear virtually none of the costs of this belief. There is a tiny chance that my belief
may have some effect on public policy; if so, the costs will be borne by society as a
whole (and particularly immigrants); only a negligible portion of it will be borne by me
personally.
This idea can explain why people vote against their own self-interest. Suppose I am a
cowardly young man who wants us to stay out of war because I don't want to be drafted. I
might well vote for the war nonetheless. My single vote makes almost no difference to
the actual outcome, and I can in this way pretend to myself and other people,
especially young ladies, that I am actually very brave. The pretending to myself is
important if the vote is by secret ballot, because I would also have the alternative of
voting against the war but telling everybody I am in favor of it.
Much more commonly nowadays, we will see a young man taking liberal positions in favor of giving lots of government help to the poor and victimized and in favor of regulating safety and helping the environment at any cost. This is a good way to show that you are a "90's Man," who would be a good husband or boyfriend because you are kind-hearted, open with your wallet, and easily fooled by a woman. Once you are married, however, our young man will change his position to a more conservative one.
One of the most interesting features of this idea is that the policy a person uses for his pose might suit that person even better if it is a clearly stupid policy. The young man who is trying to display bravery will vote all the more heartily for a war in which success is hopeless because the enemy is so much more powerful, just to show that he doesn't care about losing his life. The young man who is trying to display a kind heart will vote all the more heartiliy for an environmental policy which spends billions without much chance of helping the environment at all, just to show that he is full of good feelings and heedless of money.
The idea goes farther than just voting. It applies to speaking, writing, and campaigning too. Few are the people whose speeches, writings, and campaigning makes a difference at the national level. If I write against the "sabbatical rent tax deduction" that is such a boondoggle for professors, for example, I don't really have to worry that my efforts will make it less likely I can take the deduction again as I did last time (in Cambridge, where I got to deduct my $5,000/month rent, which combined with my half-salary to put me down near zero taxable income for each half-year!). If I were a visiting economist at the Treasury Department for a year, I'd have more temptation to keep quiet, however, precisely because I would have some slight influence on what items got on the political agenda.
Posing has its good side too. Democracy often reaches bad outcomes if every person votes for his self-interest, because information is ill-dispersed and special interests can slip their laws through without most people noticing. A good constitution and political procedures, such as we had in the U.S. before, say, 1932, can avoid much of this, but not all of it, and maintaining that kind of constitution is difficult (it isn't enough just to write it; one has to enforce it, which is hard if the special interests are constantly looking for ways to subvert it without anybody noticing). If, however, people vote not for their own interests, but for the public good-- or even if just for what they, ignorant as they may be, perceive to be the public good-- we can attain the public good. The people voting for it will wish the public good had lost out to their own selfish interests, but they won't admit to it, perhaps not even to themselves.
Instead, though, what we often see is voting by class. Blacks vote for policies that will benefit blacks, farmers for policies that will help farmers, old people for polcies that will help old people, even though they know the policies are against the public interest. A big part of statesmanship is how to avoid this. It can be done by rhetoric. People have to be persuaded that it is a sign of a bad person to act on behalf of one's own class rather than on behalf of either oneself (in which case people often would not vote at all, a better outcome) or on behalf of the public generally (the best outcome). This is what many countries have done in trying to replace local ethnic or geographic identities with national identities. Heroes have to be publicized who act against their class and in favor of the public. This is a delicate matter, and I don't know of good analysis of it, even though practical politicians have long been doing it.
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