To help answer this question, consider a community of ninety people, living, perhaps, during the Bronze Age. For simplicity, let’s assume that all the members are purely selfish. The ninety people are governed by a village council of nine, elected annually. At the end of every year, every one of the ninety people gives a campaign speech, and whoever can persuade the most people to vote for them wins.
Why would 90 perfectly selfish people agree to subject themselves to the outcome of this collective choice procedure if it wouldn’t be in their interest to do so? If they did, then they wouldn’t be perfectly selfish.
Isn’t it more reasonable to think that selfish people would makes deals on a case by case basis (only ones that benefit them on net) and would not bind themselves to obeying the outcome of a collective choice rule that could produce outcomes that harmed their interests.
I don’t want to get too far off-track from the theme of your post, but I think adding the premise that the agents be perfectly selfish is in tension with how your hypothetical is supposed to play out.
Being able to make collective choices at all seems to be an obvious benefit, even given pure selfishness. To consider a simpler example, imagine a group of twelve purely selfish soldiers. Would these soldiers agree to appoint a lieutenant, who they would agree to obey the orders of? Well, if they do appoint a lieutenant, there’s a chance that the lieutenant will order them to do something dangerous. But if they don’t appoint a lieutenant, they won’t be able to fight effectively and will all be killed by the enemy anyway. The selfish choice is clearly to appoint the lieutenant.
Even if they would all agree to choose a lieutenant and obey his orders, that doesn’t mean they would agree to abide by a collective choice rule that effectively gives the majority a permanent blank check. The battle scenario involves a unanimous agreement (that is only a special case of collective choice and happens to align perfectly with individual choice). Your battle scenario seems more like what I meant by “case by case basis” than agreeing to do whatever the village council says (even if it hurts their individual interests).
Presumably, the selfish agents wouldn’t agree to give the lieutenant unlimited power over them or even rule beyond the length of the battle. Even if everyone agrees to abide by the collective choice for a given action, why would they agree to be bound by collective choice for any action the majority agrees to take up?
I might agree beforehand to help pay for a pizza with a topping that is selected by the majority of my two friends and I, but I surely wouldn’t agree to be bound to do anything that my two friends agree should be done.
Feel free to ignore this comment if it is distracting you from the goal of your post.
They are perfectly selfish, not perfectly rational. Even a selfish person can believe it is intrinsically good to have a lieutenant (king, council) above them.
Perhaps it is an established tradition to have a council and there are penalties for disobedience. One can’t always destroy the social order, never mind how much selfish one is.
Why would 90 perfectly selfish people agree to subject themselves to the outcome of this collective choice procedure if it wouldn’t be in their interest to do so? If they did, then they wouldn’t be perfectly selfish.
Isn’t it more reasonable to think that selfish people would makes deals on a case by case basis (only ones that benefit them on net) and would not bind themselves to obeying the outcome of a collective choice rule that could produce outcomes that harmed their interests.
I don’t want to get too far off-track from the theme of your post, but I think adding the premise that the agents be perfectly selfish is in tension with how your hypothetical is supposed to play out.
Being able to make collective choices at all seems to be an obvious benefit, even given pure selfishness. To consider a simpler example, imagine a group of twelve purely selfish soldiers. Would these soldiers agree to appoint a lieutenant, who they would agree to obey the orders of? Well, if they do appoint a lieutenant, there’s a chance that the lieutenant will order them to do something dangerous. But if they don’t appoint a lieutenant, they won’t be able to fight effectively and will all be killed by the enemy anyway. The selfish choice is clearly to appoint the lieutenant.
Even if they would all agree to choose a lieutenant and obey his orders, that doesn’t mean they would agree to abide by a collective choice rule that effectively gives the majority a permanent blank check. The battle scenario involves a unanimous agreement (that is only a special case of collective choice and happens to align perfectly with individual choice). Your battle scenario seems more like what I meant by “case by case basis” than agreeing to do whatever the village council says (even if it hurts their individual interests).
Presumably, the selfish agents wouldn’t agree to give the lieutenant unlimited power over them or even rule beyond the length of the battle. Even if everyone agrees to abide by the collective choice for a given action, why would they agree to be bound by collective choice for any action the majority agrees to take up?
I might agree beforehand to help pay for a pizza with a topping that is selected by the majority of my two friends and I, but I surely wouldn’t agree to be bound to do anything that my two friends agree should be done.
Feel free to ignore this comment if it is distracting you from the goal of your post.
They are perfectly selfish, not perfectly rational. Even a selfish person can believe it is intrinsically good to have a lieutenant (king, council) above them.
Perhaps it is an established tradition to have a council and there are penalties for disobedience. One can’t always destroy the social order, never mind how much selfish one is.