Someone in Public Choice asked me how I could have specialized in Public Choice Theory in grad school and base my politics on race.
He points out, correctly, what Public Choice argues that political behavior is based on PERSONAL, not group, interests.
How can I agree that Public Choice leads to many correct conclusions, yet my motivation is racial, not personal.
I have a short answer to this:
“The essential weakness of Public Choice theory is that it cannot explain why people VOTE in national elections.”
“It takes effort, and on big election days standing in line takes a LOT of effort.”
“The probability of your vote affecting the outcome, and the resultant effect on YOU, is about zero.”
“So:”
“1) What gets people out to vote is a COMMUNAL imperative, a sincere belief that something more than their own interests are at stake.”
“The fact is that a person’s communal beliefs DO tend to coincide with his personal biases. So a lawyer who votes Democratic because of his personal interests as a trial lawyer genuinely BELIEVES trial lawyers are right for his COMMUNITY.”
“Why?”
“2) Because all his influences tend in that direction. But it is not a ‘rational’ choice based on self-interest. He believes what he supports is genuinely good for the group. Otherwise it would not be rational for him, in personal interest terms, to vote at all. The probability that he will affect the final outcome and therefore his OWN interests by going to all the trouble of voting are so close to zero as makes no difference.”
“As usual, my disagreement always begins with something people IN the field do not even notice.”
“Your disagreement with my communal or racial ideas is probably related to this same mistake that is fundamental to Public Choice.”
“Public Choice, with its unfortunate initials PC, is based based on correct point 2), but it totally ignores Poiint 1).”
“Public Choice reaches many correct conclusions because it relates the natural tendency of people to believe that what is good for them is good for everybody. It rejects the concept of group loyalty.”
But this rejection of communal loyalty is disproven by the existence of the vote itself.
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