An Evolutionary Approach to Social Welfare

ISBN-13: 9780415323352 / Angielski / Twarda / 2003 / 272 str.

Christian Sartorius; C. Sartorius

Opis

A person finds a lost purse with a lot of money in it. Ought she try to return it to its owner or keep it herself? And even more interestingly, what will she actually do? According to standard economic theory, a rational person is supposed to maximize her utility and, at least when unobserved, keep the purse for herself. In reality, however, most people return the purse although they are unobserved or, at least, they feel uneasy about not doing so. Evidently, these people share a common attitude towards other people's property. In social life, norms and values like this typically help in settling potential conflicts of interest to the mutual benefit of all. While not evident immediately, social norms and values play a crucial role in the theory of social choice. In the first half of the twentieth century, the special acknowledgement by economic theory of the autonomy of individuals and their subjective view of the world had led to the serious problem that socially acceptable decisions could not be made in the absence of unanimity. In this work, social norms and values are reintroduced to overcome this shortcoming by applying a common standard and, thus, making individua preferences

Spis treści

Introduction Part One: Evolution, Behavior, and Learning 1. Evolution and Learning - the Rise of Behavioral Plasticity 2. Motivation and Well-being 3. Propagation of Behavioral Determinants Part Two: Coordination, Cooperation and Social Welfare 4. The Significance of the Group for the Evolution of Order and Cooperation 5. Welfare and Evolution

O autorze

Christian Sartorius is Post-doctoral research fellow in the Energy Systems Unit of the Technical University of Berlin, Germany.