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The Moral Basis Of Prosperity And Oppression: Altruism, Other-Regarding Behaviour And Identity

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  • Basu, Kaushik

Abstract

Much of economics is built on the assumption that individuals are driven by self-interest and economic development is an outcome of the free play of such individuals. On the few occasions that the existence of altruism is recognized in economics, the tendency is to build this from the axiom of individual selfishness. The aim of this paper is to break from this tradition and to treat as a primitive that individuals are endowed with the ‘cooperative spirit’, which allows them to work in their collective interest, even when that may not be in their self-interest. The paper tracks the interface between altruism and group identity. By using the basic structure of a Prisoner's Dilemma game among randomly picked individuals and building into it assumptions of general or in-group altruism, the paper demonstrates how our selfish rationality interacts with our innate sense of cooperation. The model is used to outline circumstances under which cooperation will occur and circumstances where it will break down. The paper also studies how sub-groups of a society can form cooperative blocks, whether to simply do better for themselves or exploit others.

Suggested Citation

  • Basu, Kaushik, 2010. "The Moral Basis Of Prosperity And Oppression: Altruism, Other-Regarding Behaviour And Identity," Economics and Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 26(2), pages 189-216, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:ecnphi:v:26:y:2010:i:02:p:189-216_00
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    Cited by:

    1. Afridi, Farzana & Dhillon, Amrita & Li, Sherry Xin & Sharma, Swati, 2020. "Using social connections and financial incentives to solve coordination failure: A quasi-field experiment in India's manufacturing sector," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    2. Cadsby, C. Bram & Servátka, Maroš & Song, Fei, 2013. "How competitive are female professionals? A tale of identity conflict," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 284-303.
    3. Morita, Hodaka & Servátka, Maroš, 2013. "Group identity and relation-specific investment: An experimental investigation," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 95-109.
    4. Cason, Timothy N. & Lau, Sau-Him Paul & Mui, Vai-Lam, 2019. "Prior interaction, identity, and cooperation in the Inter-group Prisoner's Dilemma," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 613-629.
    5. Sebastian Silva-Leander, 2011. "On the Possibility of Measuring Freedom: A Kantian Perspective," OPHI Working Papers 49, Queen Elizabeth House, University of Oxford.
    6. Monga Célestin, 2017. "Working Paper 261 - Post-Macroeconomics: Some Theoretical and Analytical Issues," Working Paper Series 2372, African Development Bank.
    7. Ulrike Müller, 2012. "Pro-poor Service Delivery and Social Identity," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2012-055, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    8. Khalil, Elias L., 2020. "The isomorphism hypothesis: The prisoner's dilemma as intertemporal allocation, and vice versa," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 176(C), pages 735-746.
    9. Jiang, Jiang & Li, Sherry Xin, 2019. "Group identity and partnership," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 160(C), pages 202-213.
    10. Stefano Dughera & Alain Marciano, 2020. "Altruism, predation and the Samaritan's dilemma," Working Papers hal-02550432, HAL.
    11. Tom R. Burns & Ewa Roszkowska & Nora Machado Des Johansson & Ugo Corte, 2018. "Paradigm Shift in Game Theory: Sociological Re-Conceptualization of Human Agency, Social Structure, and Agents’ Cognitive-Normative Frameworks and Action Determination Modalities," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 7(3), pages 1-40, March.
    12. Hodaka Morita & Maroš Servátka, 2016. "Does Group Identity Prevent Inefficient Investment in Outside Options? An Experimental Investigation," Research in Experimental Economics, in: Experiments in Organizational Economics, volume 19, pages 105-126, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    13. Alain Marciano, 2022. "Sado-Masochism in Buchanan's Samaritan's Dilemma. A Constitutional Perspective," Post-Print hal-03683854, HAL.
    14. Müller, Ulrike, 2012. "Pro-poor Service Delivery and Social Identity," WIDER Working Paper Series 055, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).

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