This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Elster, J. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Some Unresolved Problems in the Theory of Rational Behavior

Department of Political Science, University of Chicago

In an article written in 1977 the author offered a survey of unresolved problems in rational choice theory. The present paper is an attempt to rethink this issue. On the one hand, it emphasizes the question of indeterminacy, i.e situations in which the rational choice is not well defined The paradoxes of backward induction find their place here, as do the existence and importance of genuine uncertainty (as distinct from risk) On the other hand, the article discusses the question whether preferences can be said to be rational. Examples include time preferences, attitudes to risk, regret and the 'taste for fairness'. The examples are chosen with a view to showing that rational choice theory is not a predictive theory, but essentially a hermeneutic one. As part of the enterprise of self-understanding, the construction of rationality is partly discovery and partly decision There is no nght answer to all questions.

Acta Sociologica, Vol. 36, No. 3, 179-189 (1993)
DOI: 10.1177/000169939303600303


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

				W. De Haan and J. Vos A crying shame: The over-rationalized conception of man in the rational choice perspective Theoretical Criminology, February 1, 2003; 7(1): 29 - 54. [Abstract] [PDF]