Summary
of Chapter 2 of Democracy Defended
·
The first section of this chapter seeks to “establish
further the influence of Riker and his Rochester School”, giving a detailed
historical narrative. [23]
·
Mackie makes concrete Riker’s importance in the
field: “At one point, Riker had published more refereed articles in the American Political Science Review, the
premier journal of the political science profession, than any other figure
(Miller, Tien, and Peebler 1996) […] A
New Handbook of Political Science (Goodin and Klingemann 1996) cites Riker,
his student Shepsle, and co-author Weingast as three of the eleven most
frequently referenced authors discipline-wide (31) […]” [23-24]
·
Mackie explains the origins of Riker’s movement:
The Rochester school movement “was born when in the 1960s the Xerox
Corporation, headquartered in Rochester, New York, richly endowed the
University of Rochester to upgrade its social science departments; Riker was
hired to do that job in political science, and over time brought the department
from nowhere to one of the most successful in the country (279). Among its
other contributions, Riker and the Rochester school “used Arrow’s result to
question the efficacy of democratic government in producing outcomes that are
somehow publicly beneficial,” they say (286).” [24]
·
“Although the Rochester school is not he
majority force in the political science discipline, it is the modal force in
it.” [25]
·
Mackie starts explicating some of the criticisms
that have been made of this sweeping intellectual movement and rational choice
theory in general. Mackie thinks rational choice theory has been abused, but he
does not seek to condemn it in general terms; he is not on the side of those
absolutely hostile to mathematical and economics-influenced political science. “A
cover story in The New Republic, “Revenge
of the Nerds,” was devoted to Riker and his followers (Cohn 1999). I relate,
but do not endorse, some of its contents. The article is an attack on rational
choice theory in general, which Cohn identifies with Riker and his Rochester
school; but that is not quite correct, there is also the Virginia school, the
Bloomington school, the left-liberals formerly centred at the University of
Chicago, and individuals not otherwise classified […] The insiders are said to
maintain a unified front, to cite and to referee one another’s papers, to
preach that their approach is the only legitimate method in political science,
and to establish litmus tests for faculty hiring, according to Cohn’s
disgruntled and anonymous informants. “‘Because they are not as broad-minded,
they had the advantage,’ says one senior scholar at Harvard. ‘They’d support
any candidate who did rational choice, oppose any non-rational-choice scholars,’”
Cohn relates.” [25]
·
Mackie describes the origin of the ‘post-autistic’
economic movement. “In June 2000, economic students in Paris rebelled against
their rigidly formalist curriculum. Among the reasons they gave were:
1.)
We wish to escape from imaginary worlds!
2.)
We oppose the uncontrolled use of mathematics!
3.)
We are for a pluralism of approaches in
economics!
The students opposed the use of mathematics as an end in
itself, deplored the domination of economics by highly ideological neoclassical
theory, and they rejected what they called its repressive dogmatism. They
favoured intellectual engagement with concrete empirical realities, a pluralism
of approaches, and science rather than an obscurantist scientism. The rebellion,
which came to be known as the Post-Autistic Economics Movement (www.paecon.net), spread through France, the
Continent, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Parallel declarations
emerged at Cambridge University and at a Kansas City conference. The French
minister of culture appointed a commission to investigate student concerns,
which eventually recommended reforms endorsed by the students.” [26]
·
Mackie moves onto explicating the “doctrine of
democratic irrationalism” promoted by Riker and his followers. He makes clear
once more that he is not opposed to rational choice theory as a research
programme: “The theory of democratic irrationalism is a species of the genus
rational choice theory, but I criticize the species and not the genus. The theory
is one justification for laissez-faire, or perhaps for total anarchism; if
successful, my criticism eliminates that irrationalist justification for
laissez-faire or anarchism, but not other justifications.” [27]
·
He further expands on his pluralist philosophy
of political inquiry and gives further endorsement of formal methods in
political science: “I see the study of politics as an interpretive enterprise.
A plurality of methods contributes to that enterprise, and the methods of
rational choice theory are especially but not exclusively useful for describing
and explaining some collective actions, strategically interdependent actions,
and the character and consequences of voting rules. Although the terms are used
informally and interchangeably, social
choice theory is simply the formal description of economic and political
aggregation, and is indispensable even if some of it is sterile and scholastic.
I cannot imagine doing without noncooperative game theory which in the
right hands yields rich insights into social life, along with testable, and
supported, predictions (for example, see Mackie 1996); although some formal
work is irrelevant and some applied work is unimaginative.” [27]
·
Mackie
makes an important point about assumptions of egoism necessary for the models
not necessarily implying that one believes that humans are egoistic: “Although
many rational choice practitioners believe that their method requires the
assumption of egoism, it need not, and I wholeheartedly reject the assumption
that humans are exclusively motivated by egoistic concerns. I agree with Elster’s
Davidsonian account of rational choice theory in the narrow sense, as an initial assumption, in interpreting
individual human action, of the consistency of beliefs and of desires; and I
agree with his claim that there is no alternative to it as a set of normative
prescriptions (Elster 1986a).” [27-28]
·
“The scientistic aspirations of the Rochester school
are dashed by Green and Shapiro’s demonstration of methodological pathologies
such as post hoc theory development,
vague or slippery predictions, and selective use of evidence. These pathologies
are not necessary implications of the use of formal models in political
science, however.” [28]
·
Mackie clearly has concerns with the power of
rational choice theory in political science, in comparison with other
methodologies: “If the effect of rational choice on the study of politics is to
keep too many scholars and students away from historical knowledge, contextual
understandings, exposure to multiple cultures, broadminded appreciation of
human motivations, the formulation and testing of competing hypotheses, or the
facts and feelings of politics, then its costs would exceed its benefits.” [28]
·
Mackie finally speaks explicitly about ideology
and the inherent fraudulence and philosophical wrongheadedness of the ‘positivist’
methodology in the social sciences: “Although there are socialists and
left-liberals who do not contest Riker’s irrationalist [democratic
irrationalist] theory, its primary appeal is to the economic right. Public
choice theory, in the narrow sense of the term, is the assertion by the
Virginia school that government should be limited in order to avoid damaging
policies enacted by self-seeking interest groups, politicians, and bureaucrats,
and the assertion by the Rochester school that government should be limited
because democratic outcomes are arbitrary and meaningless. Shapiro (1996, 43)
remarks that “the implicit counterfactual in this tradition is that private
action is essentially benign,” rather than anarchic chaos. For the public
choice tradition, says Shapiro, collective action is only necessary in
instances of market failure, but there is no rational way of organizing
collective action. Remarkably though, as I shall later show in detail, the
Arrow theorem applies to the market, there are strong analogues to the
political chaos theorems in economic theory, and the market, too, is subject to
strategic misrepresentation of preferences.” [30]
·
“It might seem curious that irrationalist theory
cavils at hypothetical and unproven deviations from the democratic ideal of
equal influence in politics, but neglects actual and proven distortions such as
the campaign finance problem in the United States (Drew 2000). Kutner (1996,
347) claims that “Public Choice theory is almost entirely silent on the
disproportionate purchase of influence by big money.” The irrationalists do not
criticize democracy in practice, I surmise, because practical defects are
remediable. The remedy may be difficult to accomplish or involve an
unacceptable tradeoff with other values, but remedies are conceivable. Riker’s
point is not that democracy is imperfectly approximated in practice. Riker
wants to establish that democracy has defects that are irremediable in
principle (also see Weale 1999, 140).” [30]
·
“My defense does not pertain to the whole of
democracy and liberalism. Rather my attention is confined to a single question
of major importance: the possibility of
accurate and fair amalgamation of opinions and wants.” [31]
·
Mackie begins to explore Riker’s writings in
more detail:
“Riker’s
(1982) volume opens with a discussion of the normative features of democracy
(adapted, with radical changes, from his 1953 book on democracy in the US).
Riker tells us that the democratic ideal is
one of individual self-realization and individual self-respect. The democratic method is the free and equal participation
of each citizen in the political life of the community. Hitherto democratic
theory has assumed that democratic ends (ideals) can be attained by democratic
means (or methods), but Riker says that this assumption may or may not be true.
Social choice theory will help us decide whether or not the assumption is true,
whether or not democracy is unattainable. The Platonic and Marxist conceptions
of justice were not attainable, he says, because in each case the means could
not reach the end. The same question should be asked of democracy as of those
conceptions of justice: do its means attain its ends? […]
There are two interpretations of voting, the liberal and the populist, which Riker implicitly treats as exhaustive and
exclusive. Warning: Riker’s usage of the two terms is idiosyncratic, polysemic,
and inconsistent at crucial points in his argument. The liberal view is Madisonian,
Riker maintains at this point in his narrative, and the populist view is
Rousseauvian. Riker eventually concedes that his liberalism would not be
endorsed by Madison, and I will shortly show that his populism would not be
endorsed by Rousseau. The liberal view, says Riker, is that the purpose of
voting is to control officials, and nothing more. Madison, he writes, held it necessary that republican government
derive all of its powers directly or indirectly from the great body of the
people, and sufficient that it be
administered by officials who hold office for limited periods (Federalist No.
39, in Hamilton, Jay, and Madison n.d. (1937)/1787). […] All democrats accept
the necessary condition, but only Riker’s “liberal” democrats accept the
sufficient condition, he claims. […] Populism assumes popular competence, that
the electorate is right. Liberalism assumes that the electorate can change
officials only if many people are dissatisfied or hope for a better
performance. All liberalism requires is that officials can be rejected by election;
however, in order to avoid rejection, officials do act so as to avoid giving
offense to future majorities; the union of those many possible future majorities
is often most of the electorate, hence liberal officials are approximately
agents of the people, and thus liberalism satisfies the democratic ideal of
self-control, Riker concludes.
For the populist, according to Riker, liberty and hence
self-control are obtained by embodying the will of the people in the action of
officials. Rousseau is the exemplar, or perhaps the demon, of populism.
Rousseau posited a general will that
is the objectively correct common interest of the incorporated citizens, which
is computed by consulting the citizens, Riker claims. “What the sovereign people,
when speaking for the public interest, want is justified because the sovereign
people want it and because it is their liberty” (12). […] The hurried reader
might reject populism as portrayed by Riker because it is so painfully obvious that
democratic decisions can be factually and morally mistaken. Who could be so
silly as to believe that actual democratic decisions by definition precisely carry out some “general will”
and thus that they are always true or right? The hurried reader would be
attracted to Riker’s liberalism which, at this point, requires only that the
decisions of democratic officials approximately
satisfy the opinions and desires of the people. The hurried reader would be
mistaken.” [31-33]
·
Mackie corrects Riker’s misrepresentation of
Rousseau:
“As is
well known, Rousseau distinguished the general
will from the will of all […] The
general will, true or right, is independent from the will of all, which can err
in attaining the general will. The will of all, actual democratic decision,
might err because it is mistaken about some fact of the matter, or might err
because it aggregates partial interests rather than judgments about the general
interest […] Thus, for Rousseau, and for the younger Riker, actual democratic
decisions variably approximate rather
than define the general will or
public good. The democratic public good is defined independently from the
output of actual democratic
procedures, these days perhaps as the output of an ideal procedure, or by
subjective utilitarianism, or by objective measures of welfare such as of
health, nutrition, longevity, or by appeal to ethical intuitions, or by secular
extension of religious revelation […] Riker’s
populism is an absurd doctrine, one not even endorsed by its supposed
champion Rousseau. Why is Riker tempted into this error about Rousseau? In his
first chapter he maintains that his liberalism approximates the public good,
and if it were sufficient for populism only to approximate the public good,
then his distinction between liberalism and populism would collapse. If there
were no distinction between the two, then Riker’s argument against the populism
he wants to attack would apply as well to the liberalism he wants to defend;
and then the final conclusion, according to Riker himself, would be that democracy
is wholly indefensible (241).” [33-34]
·
Then there is “the third source of error in
identifying the general will: the basic problems of aggregating opinions and
desires introduced in the previous chapter. Because different voting systems
may yield different outcomes from the same profile of individual voters’
preferences, he argues democracy is inaccurate.
Different methods of aggregating individuals’ fixed choices may yield different
group choices. Furthermore, although one or more voting rules may be better
than other voting rules in a particular setting, there is no one uniquely justified
voting rule across settings. Finally, from the outcome of any vote it is not
possible to infer enough about citizens’ preferences to determine whether that
outcome is a true and fair aggregation of those preferences. Next, Riker
continues, given a fixed voting system, then democracy is meaningless: the outcome of voting is manipulable, and it is not possible
to distinguish manipulated from unmanipulated outcomes because of the unknowability
of private intentions underlying public actions. […] the Arrow’s theorem shows
more generally that, assuming all logically possible individual orderings over
alternative social states, no method of aggregating individuals’ transitive
preference orderings guarantees a collective preference ordering that is transitive.
Therefore, even the same method of aggregating individuals’ fixed choices may
yield different group choices, as the choice arbitrarily or manipulatively
cycles from one alternative to the next. Associated with the possibility of
cycling are the possibilities of unfairly manipulating the outcome by means of
strategic voting, agenda control, and introduction of new alternatives or
dimensions to the issue space.
The liberal interpretation of voting, says Riker, accepts
that democratic voting and discussion are inaccurate and meaningless. The only
democracy that withstands the scrutiny of “modern political science” (Riker and
Weingast 1988, 396) [LOOOOOOL] is the liberal institution of regular elections
that permits both the rejection of tyrannical rulers and the “circulation of
leadership” (Riker 1982, 253), preferably supplemented by the liberal constraints
of divided government […]
One problem with Riker’s “liberal” justification of voting
is that his proposed constraint is no constraint at all and thus officials
would do as they please (see Cohen 1986, 30). True, if there is a random chance
of getting a ticket for driving faster than the speed limit, then my speeding
is constrained. But if there is a random chance of getting a ticket whether or
not I am driving faster than the speed limit, then I will do as I please.
In the first chapter of the volume, Riker’s liberalism approximates
the public good (11); but in frank contradiction by the last chapter of the
volume there is no such thing as a knowable public good, the connection between
the democratic electorate and its officials is random, and Riker has to admit
that Madison would not endorse his conception (242-243). […] The instrumental
and negative purpose of participation,
to restrain oppressive rule, is thwarted under the liberal interpretation fo
voting, because the removal of officials is not only imperfect, but wholly
random, and officials are thus unrestrained. The intrinsic and positive purpose
of participation, to further the
individual’s self-control, is thwarted, because there is no knowable relationship
between the individual’s vote and the collective outcome. Liberty is unguarded, because there is no effective restraint on
officials. Equality is mocked, because
any one decision can be unfairly manipulated, and hence all decisions could be
unfairly manipulated, if the older Riker’s argument is correct.
[…] We need not be cornered by Riker’s definition of “populism,”
however. We are free to adopt a more standard view, that it is sufficient for
the outcomes of actual democratic procedure to approximate a democratic ideal
of the public good. In this volume I will endeavor to show that, in principle,
democratic procedures adequately approximate
the public good.
If the reader is a bit vague about the distinction between
populism and liberalism, some concrete examples may help. A present-day
manifestation of populism, according to Riker in 1982, is Marcus Raskin of the
American New Left, and a present-day manifestation of liberalism is William
Rusher of the American New Right. Populism is typified by American
progressivism and Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal (Riker 1982, 63), and Riker’s liberalism
would roll back progressive-era and New Deal reforms and re-establish the
minimal state of the Gilded Age (Riker and Weingast 1988).” [SO MUCH FOR
VALUE-FREE, EH?] [34-36]
·
Mackie reviews and criticises Riker’s “basic
argument pattern”:
“Riker’s
several lines of attack against the populist interpretation of voting all
ultimately depend on the following pattern of argument:
(1)
Because of cycling, strategic voting, agenda
control, and multidimensional issue spaces, it is possible that the outcome of
any one vote can be manipulated.
(a)
If underlying preferences must be indirectly
inferred, then it is possible in any one instance of voting for there to be undetected manipulation;
(b)
Revealed tastes, actual choices such as votes,
are directly observed, but true tastes, the underlying preferences, must be
indirectly inferred;
(c)
Undetected manipulation is possible in any one
instance of voting.
(2)
(a)
If undetected manipulation is possible in any
one instance of voting then it is possible in all instances taken together;
(b)
Undetected manipulation is possible in any one
instance of voting (1c);
(c)
Therefore, in all instances taken together,
underlying preferences cannot be inferred from votes.
(3)
(a)
If underlying preferences of individuals cannot
be known, then it is impossible to aggregate such preferences;
(b)
Underlying preferences cannot be known (2c);
(c)
Therefore, it is impossible to aggregate
underlying preferences; any such claim is meaningless.
Notice that by substituting “communication” for references
to voting in (2), the amended argument would prove the “meaninglessness” of all
communication, including political discussion.
Riker claims not only that undetected
manipulation is possible (1c) but also that it is frequent, but the frequency
claim is not essential to his argument. Moreover, the frequency claim verges on
self-contradiction: if true preferences cannot be known (2c), then it would not
be possible for any observer to estimate the frequency of manipulation. Also,
the claim that actual choices are directly observed but that underlying preferences
must be inferred (1b) is heuristic in some investigations but it is not
fundamental […]
Nevertheless, we may for the sake of
argument grant Riker his claim that preferences are inferred from choice (1b).
His fatal error is the move from the claim that undetected manipulation is
possible in any one instance to the claim that in all instances taken together
it is therefore impossible to infer preferences from choices (2a). I will argue
that (2a) is defective and thus that (2c) does not follow; it is false that in
all instances taken together, underlying preferences cannot be inferred from
votes. What does my conclusion do to the claim that it is impossible to
aggregate preferences? Riker’s third argument is that if underlying preferences
are unknowable, then it is impossible to aggregate such preferences (3a), or if p then q. I say that underlying
preferences are knowable, not-p. In
the present context, then, I do not show generally that it is possible to aggregate
preferences. I only show here that if it were impossible to aggregate
preferences then the unknowability of preferences would not be the reason for
such an impossibility.” [37-39]
·
“Riker’s claim is that if communication is
limited to voting choice, then it is impossible to know underlying preferences.
This may be so for each of our votes
taken alone, but from that it does not follow that it is so for all of our votes considered together. A
series of votes on similar issues would begin to generate enough data to allow
inference of underlying preferences, presuming that the individual level
logically consistent beliefs, their correspondence to objects, and transitively
consistent desires, that are sufficiently similar.
For example, suppose that we observe that a legislator
votes for alternative C over alternative B in the first stage of a plurality
runoff among alternatives A, B, and C, and that alternative C wins the most
votes in the first stage. Then in the runoff between C and A we observe that the
legislator votes for A, and that A is victorious in the runoff. So far, we have
observed that the legislator chooses A > C > B. The next day a binary
vote arises between alternatives B’ and C’ and the legislator votes for B’ over
C’, contradicting yesterday’s vote for C over B. At this point an observer can
generate a number of hypotheses. Perhaps the legislator blundered or is
irrational. If we assume that the legislator’s actions are rational, then one
plausible hypothesis is that his true preference is B over C and that yesterday
he was engaged in strategic (also termed “sophisticated”) voting: the
legislator and his allies knew that the chamber’s distribution of preference
orders was such that if they voted sincerely for B in the first stage B would
go into the runoff and defeat A their more favored alternative, so they strategically
voted for C in the first stage. Contrary to Riker, the possibility of
manipulation has not obscured our inference of the legislator’s underlying
preferences, rather, just the opposite, our knowledge of the possibility has
enabled the inference of preference ranking. Now suppose that that we are able
to make a third observation and a fourth observation: the legislator votes for
B’’ over C’’ and B’’’ over C’’’. That strengthens the hypothesis that the
legislator’s true preference is B over C.
The foregoing is merely from assuming internal consistency
of desires and understanding the logical properties of voting rules. Considerations
of external consistency may improve the inference of an individual’s preference
rankings. Suppose that alternative A is for high social-security payments, B is
for medium social-security payments, and C is for low social-security payments.
Then on the first day’s vote we would be able to hypothesize that voting for C
over B was strategic: although there may actually be occasional contexts where
it makes sense to prefer high payments to low payments to medium payments,
generally someone will prefer high over medium over low. Or suppose that alternative
A is aid to the third world, B is labor organizing rights, and C is costly
imperialist war memorials. From what we know about the coherence of ideologies
we are again able to hypothesize immediately that the legislator’s true
preferences are A > B > C and that his vote for C (imperialist war
memorials) over B (labor organizing rights) was strategic in nature.
[…] Finally, public discussion of surrounding the votes
provides even more data with which to “triangulate” on a reading of others’
underlying preferences. Suppose that when the legislator voted for C over B he
said out loud in a speech that his true preference is for B over C and that his
vote was strategic in order to thwart the unfair attempt by the opposition to
manipulate the outcome via agenda control. His announcement itself could have
been a strategic lie, but it is a piece of evidence that gains strength from
other considerations, for example if he later votes for B’ over C’, or if he is
known never to lie about such things. […]
The sceptical political theorist infers preferences behind
choices in every human situation, evne, as it turns out, in making his case
against the possibility of doing so. Riker uses the very methods of inference I
have recited in his case studies that purport to demonstrate pervasive
political disequilibrium and obscurity of preferences. I will argue that Riker’s
inference of preferences in each of these cases was clearly mistaken, but that
does not change my point against him on the knowability of preferences. My
point is the transcendent one that he must
assume that preferences are knowable in order to attempt his demonstration that
they are not. Further, the fact that I am able to present reasoning and
evidence that supports one hypothesized set of underlying preference rankings
and undermines another hypothesized set of preference rankings shows again that
inference of underlying preference from surface manifestations is not only
possible but also normal and uncontroversial everyday occurrence. […]
Riker’s […] analysis of the Powell amendment makes an implicit auxiliary
assumption that elected representatives represent the interests of their
districts. He goes on to confidently identify five “natural political groups”
(!), almost the exact number of representatives in each group, and the
preferences of each group over three
alternatives (Riker 1986, 118-122). He seems to have forgotten, among other
things, that on his account there is no such thing as a district interest that
could be discovered by electing a representative. It is a delicious irony that
his analysis is forced to assume that Congressional districts have identifiable
interests […] In his attempts to show the empirical relevance of Arrow’s
logically possible result, Riker is forced to assume the empirical irrelevance
of Arrow’s result. In another analysis, of the Wilmot Proviso, Riker
confidently identifies eight factions and proposes an inference of the
preferences of each over three alternatives: “There were not enough votes to
ascertain preference orders, but it is easy to guess what they were” (Riker
1982, 227). Finally, from minuscule data in an obscure letter written 1,900
years ago by Pliny the Younger, Riker is able to identify and estimate the
strength of three factions in the Roman Senate on an issue, involved in a
process of voting that resulted in the socially better outcome, despite rampant
manipulation […] There is one unfortunate difference between the sceptical philosopher
and the sceptical political theorist. The philosopher would be ignored if he
recommended that human institutions be designed as if his conclusions were
true, but the political theorist might wrongly be heeded.” [41-43]
