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IDENTITY, INTEREST AND EMERGENT RATIONALITY

AN EVOLUTIONARY SYNTHESIS

Michael W. Macy

Identity and interest paradigms provide rival explanatory frameworks: One portrays group solidarity as the affirmation of cognitive categories, while the other looks for the incentives that motivate collective action among rational egoists. Neither is fully adequate. Identity theory emphasizes the cohesive effects of similarity but overlooks the causal importance of self-interest in a collective good. Interest theory emphasizes the solidary effects of interdependence but struggles to explain enthusiastic self-sacrifice and moral righteousness. I propose a synthetic reformulation of identity and interest, based on two corresponding strategies in the evolution of cooperation: kin and reciprocal altruism. This evolutionary approach, however, entails a fundamental rethinking of basic concepts in rational choice theory—a shift from `purposive' to `emergent' rationality.

Key Words: altruism • evolution • identity • learning • rationality

Rationality and Society, Vol. 9, No. 4, 427-448 (1997)
DOI: 10.1177/104346397009004003
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