Conference Papers & Current Trends

Discussion of Rational Choice Theory

Round 1: Viewpoints from across the Spectrum

Anthony Gill's Rejoinders

Rejoinders to Brett

General Response: There is a tendency to view economic analyses as sterilizing religion of its spiritual and moral dimensions, or commodifying religion.

Specific points (related to the number comments):

  1. At a certain level, Brett's critique is true. I treat both Catholic clergy and evangelical ministers the same in the following terms: I assume that they are all truly committed to their faith and interested in communicating their faith to as many people as they possibly can, often despite grave risk to their lives. This goes to the heart of my comment above - I do believe that many, if not most or nearly all, people involved in evangelization have very pure, spiritual intentions. While there are many difference between Catholics and evangelical Protestants, they are mostly minor for my analysis which seeks to explain how religious actors who are motivated to "spread the Word of God" go about doing that in a world of scarcity. As far as adding "option for the poor" to Catholics after 1968, I would also say that a large number of evangelicals also have an "option for the poor" (after all, that is where they are expanding the most). They may disagree on the specifics of how to help the poor from their plight, but I think that the implication that only Catholics has this "option" is disingenuous, especially when one considers that Protestant missionaries were quite involved in literary campaigns and other social improvement crusades in the early part of this century. Moreover, there were several Catholics who had an "option for the poor" prior to 1968, and even prior to 1962 (see below)!
  2. The role of Vatican II and Medellín have been discussed extensively in the literature on Latin American religion and there is a strong tendency to attribute the rise of the progressive Catholic Church almost solely to these two events. Other chapters in the Sigmund volume cover this, so I minimized my discussion of it. However, there are a couple methodological problems associated with the general claim that progressive Catholicism was strictly (or even primarily) the result of these two conferences. First, all bishops, and probably most clergy, in Latin America were exposed to the teachings of Vatican II and Medellín. Exposure to these ideas is thus a constant. However, not all Catholic clergy (or national episcopal conferences) adopted a progressive stance congruent with the more progressive teachings of these meetings. Thus we have variation in terms of what we are trying to explain - i.e., whether Catholic clergy became progressive or not during the 1970s. Methodologically speaking, a constant cannot explain variation. The question arises as to why some clergy were predisposed to adopt progressive teachings while others were not. Moreover, the ideas presented at VCII did not pop out of thin air; they were held by many of the organizers thus we need to figure out where they got them. Other factors were clearly involved and my paper and book are an attempt to find out these other factors. I argue that Protestant competition was a key factor in Latin America. Another possible explanation could be the psychological make-up of individual clergy, or the social norms and values within the networks various clergy associated. My intent was not to test these latter hypotheses, though they would make for interesting theses. Finally, it should be noted that progressive Catholicism and an "option for the poor" did exist in Latin America well before VCII or Medellín. I refer to Padre Alberto Hurtado in the paper (and extensively in my book) as one of the precursors of progressive Catholicism. He wrote a book in 1941 that really anticipated much of what would become known as progressive Catholicism. Catholic Action and labor unions in the early part of the century were also precursors to progressive Catholicism. Also see Hannah Stewart-Gambino's excellent book on the Catholic Church in Chile.
  3. Being in a "time warp" is advantageous in this case. Too often we only assign causal significance to events that "explode" on the scene, prompting us to lose sight of deeper historical causes. While Protestantism "exploded" in the 1980s and '90s (a natural effect of geometric expansion rates - see Rod Stark's The Rise of Christianity), evangelical Protestantism was growing at a rapid clip in many parts of Latin America as early as the 1930s. Books talking about rapid Protestant growth in Chile and Brazil were written by Lalive d'Epinay and Willems in the 1960s and referred to expansion in the '40s, '50s and '60s. While this phenomenon may be new to North American scholars (thanks to Stoll and Martin), it was readily apparent to many in South America and affected the religious landscape in important ways. In my own research, I was surprised to find out how much discussion in Catholic circles there was about this topic prior to the 1970s (and even the '60s). Again, Hurtado's 1941 book has a whole chapter on Protestant growth in Chile. At a 1954 conference of Maryknoll priests in Chimbote, Peru, it was declared that "What a bulwark they [Catholic Action movements] would be against the inroads of Protestantism and communism" (see Rendering Unto Caesar, p. 101 for full citation). Guillermo Cook, in a book published by Orbis, went as far to connect the growth of Protestantism to the Catholic base community movement as far back as 1956! (See Cook, The Expectation of the Poor, p. 64).
  4. Communism did matter a great deal to Catholic leaders. Much of the Catholic unionization ("workers' circles") in the early 1900s is a reaction to socialist and syndicalist efforts to unionize industrial (and later rural) labor, mostly in the Southern Cone countries. However, my intention in this paper was to focus on church-church interaction. The "communist threat" presents a slightly different dynamic on the part of Church leaders in that they are more willing to get the state to "take care of the problem." Perhaps one of the biggest surprises of my research is how much the Catholic Church has reacted to the Protestant challenge. In my book, I document the reaction in more detail than is presented in the paper.
  5. The case of ecumenical relations between Catholics and mainline Protestants is not contrary to my thesis, but indeed proves my point. Note that ecumenism is strongest among non-competing religions. Presbyterians, Lutherans, Congregationalists, Anglicans and most other members of the World Council of Churches are not aggressively expanding in Latin America. The more aggressive a denomination is in recruiting Catholics (or nominal Catholics), the less likely there will be any ecumenism. Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, Adventists and Pentecostals are not involved in ecumenical dialogue with the Catholic Church in Latin America (with a few rare exceptions). A similar pattern is true in U.S. history (see Finke and Stark, The Churching of America). This is not the "fault" of the Catholic Church any more than it is the other denominations.
  6. As noted above, there was a significant concern for social justice prior to Vatican II (cf., Rerum Novarum). Catholic Action, workers' circles, and other organizations in the pre-1962 era show this to be the case. Again, I am suspect of explanations that attribute VCII to a wholesale shift in the "mindset" of Catholics. It did have an impact, no doubt. However, I see VCII more as a catalyst than a cause. Those predisposed to its teachings found it useful to have Vatican endorsement for their social agendas.
  7. Agreed. The shortage of clergy (or "crisis sacerdotal" as Renato Poblete has called it) is a major factor in the Church's neglect of many people within Latin America. This is also symptomatic of a monopoly. There is a strong correlation between the market share of Catholicism and the number of priests per 10,000 Catholics (see Rendering Unto Caesar, p. 87). Indeed, since personnel are an economic resource, diverting money to sustaining a large bureaucracy means higher dead weight costs and less money available to recruit, train and pay priests. CELAM has even noted this as one of Protestantism's "unfair advantages" in Las Sectas en América Latina, p. 35-36.
  8. Actually, Liberals frequently sent their children to Catholic schools in the 1800s and early 1900s, this is noted widely in the literature. Also, the Church was preaching in urban areas and getting financial donations to keep the organization running; that had to be coming from somewhere. In general, I think the "liberal threat" to Catholicism as a religion, per se, has been greatly exaggerated during the 1800s. Liberals were opposed to the Church having political and social power, but were not necessarily against Catholicism as a faith. And I have argued elsewhere that much of the property expropriation during the 1800s was prompted by the necessity of governments to raise cash quick during the first and second rounds of debt crises in the region (c. 1820s - '60s). Secularizing marriage and funeral services also allowed the government to capture easily-collectable sources of revenue (user fee based) and the secularization of the registry helped to build a bookkeeping infrastructure for taxation.
  9. There are undoubtedly many reasons why CEBs were created, most of which I think are for very good reasons - to help the poor and teach people the Catholic faith. What I argue is that many of the techniques used by CEBs were adapted from early Protestant missions and that the Church turning to the poor was prompted by the realization that they had not effectively evangelized this sector in the past. In effect, Protestants acted as an "alarm clock." Also, the current pope is not anti-CEB (and has advocated them several times in visits to the region). Instead, the Vatican is anti-radical CEBs that threaten to challenge hierarchical authority. The encouragement (by some) of the Catholic charismatic movement seems to me to be a direct response to charismatic Protestants; the two are often found in close proximity to one another. One of the interesting features of Church organization is that it can include a wide variety of religious, political and social preferences under one umbrella.
Rejoinder to Marquis Back to Top

Prof. Marquis is correct to note that one of the weaknesses of my (and almost all) rational choice approach is the underdevelopment of a theory of preferences. Most work in economics tends to assume preferences (with the exception of the "revealed preferences" crowd). My approach has been to assume some justifiable set of preferences and derive implications from those preferences. Differing motivations (preferences, values, goals) usually imply different behavioral characteristics. Once these implications are derived, evidence can be brought to bear on whether the initial assumptions were valid or not.

Currently, I am working on an article that looks at people's values (preferences) empirically through survey data. However, as many within the field of attitudinal research will tell you, survey research has many limitations in determining an individual's actual preferences.

Rejoinders to Vasquez Back to Top

As I see it, Vasquez has two major critiques of the rational choice approach in general: 1) it is too simplistic; and 2) it doesn't add much to our understanding (in large part, a result of the first).

To begin, I need to first note that in the first paragraph there is an implication that rational choice (or economics) is most appropriate for "neoliberal, capitalist" economies. This is not necessarily the case. Rational choice, as defined above, can easily study command economies, corporatist economies, gift economies, etc. It is simply a theory of how people allocate resources to achieve goals under a variety of constraints. A command economy places different constraints on behavior than market economies. (Both of these categories are rather broad terms and any economic analysis would do better to specify more detailed constraints - e.g., specific regulations, sets of property rights, etc.). On another corrective note, Vasquez claims that game theory is the branch of economics that adds constraints to the analysis. This is not entirely true. All rational choice analysis deals with constraints in some form or another (e.g., budgets, voting regulations). Game theory deals with a specific set of constraints, namely strategic constraints (i.e., the actions of other people as they try to pursue their goals). Finally, I do not intend to say that "rational choice is economic theory," but rather, rational choice is largely congruent with microeconomic theory. Almost all microeconomic analysis are rational choice-based. There is a great deal of macroeconomic theory that is not based in microeconomic analysis (Keynes being a classic example).

As for the critique that rational choice is a simplistic theory, I must say "guilty as charged." Actually, I would say that it is a "simple" theory, not "simplistic" (which has some negative connotations). I feel that the strength of the approach is that it keeps behavioral assumptions to a minimum. (On a sidenote, I have often been critiqued for using assumptions in my research, implying that there is research that does not employ assumptions. I would like to see such a work. The strength of many rational choice studies is that they make their assumptions explicit, which invariably leaves them open to critique. So be it. Assumptions should be open for critique, not hidden and denied.)

By keeping things simple, rational choice theory tries to hold as much of the world constant as possible and analyze how certain changes in exogenous constraints affect behavior. Is the rest of the world "held constant" in reality? No, certainly not. However, if everything varies in a model without proper controls, it is difficult to determine causal mechanism. Studies that try to emphasize a "holistic" approach to understanding the world invariably end up reporting spurious relationships between variables that are not causally related. Methodologically there are ways to control for this problem (using both solid research design and/or a variety of statistical techniques). [This is not to claim that quantitative research is superior to qualitative, hence the mention of solid research design.] But there is also a role for theory here. A good theoretical model should make predicted causal mechanisms clear in a way that suggests falsifiable empirical tests. This involves simplifying the world into "bite-sized" pieces. Nowhere do I claim that rational choice is THE unifying theory in the social sciences (akin to string theory in physics). Instead, it is a theory that helps us understand how environmental constraints affect human choices. Given that the overwhelming amount of work being done on Latin American religion focuses on the importance of "doctrine," "values," "identities" and "mindsets," I consider this simple examination of constraints to be a welcome addition (not replacement) to this body of scholarship.

As to the more specific comments on "gift economies," I have no knowledge of this literature. I imagine it connects to the ongoing debate in economics as to why people give gifts for birthdays, etc. rather than cash, which is more fungible. This is an interesting question and one that is reconcilable with rational choice theory. Do people try to maximize prestige, reputation, close relations, etc.? Sure they do. This just takes us back to the question about the content of preferences raised above. I hesitate to add (not knowing the literature) that claims about preferences (self-denial, festive play) in gift economies are assumptions unless someone has discovered a way to empirically validate those assertions in a rigorous manner. It is perfectly plausible to imagine someone giving gifts with a reasonable expectation of receiving something in return in the near future, despite what they may say to a social science interviewer. A great deal of this can be picked up on the literature on reputation (see Dan Klein's edited volume on Reputation or Dennis Chong's Collective Action and the Civil Rights Movement). To date I know of no research that has been able to verify internal preferences in a rigorous manner, a topic addressed by a forthcoming paper by Michael Hechter, et. al. in the European Sociological Review. Full cite available on request. Survey research has many pitfalls and the "revealed preference" literature devolves toward tautology. To assert that people in gift economies are acting on preferences (or, perhaps, norms) of self-denial and festive play is as equally simplified as my stating that religious firms seek market share. Both analyses must make use of simplifying assumptions.

As for the claim that rational choice theories add little to our understanding of religion, that is largely in the eye of the beholder. Iannaccone's earlier work on religious human capital could be seen as confirming the findings of "socialization theory." However, what I think the approach does add - via simplification - is the ability to derive a great many more testable implications than theories that have come before. Iannaccone's work (along with Stark & Bainbridge, Finke, and others) has provide a number of testable theoretical propositions that earlier theories did not - e.g., on the role of time vs. money tradeoffs in people's religious participation. Finke & Stark's Churching of America is a wonderful example of how longstanding beliefs about religious practice in the U.S. are challenged using rational choice proposition and then tested with available data. Instead of seeing "Great Awakenings" as spontaneous events, they predict that a great deal of organization went on before such events and then show convincing evidence (in my humble opinion) that this was indeed the case. Likewise, they challenge the notion that the rise of televangelism was a function of a society lost in consumerism, and instead trace it back to changes in FCC regulations on network programming. I consider these to be important new findings, not to mention R. Stephen Warner's claim that rational choice theory has gone a long way to challenging the longstanding belief in secularization theory.

As for my own work, I certainly am beholden to the insights of many who came before me, including Ivan Vallier, Thomas Bruneau, and Ed Cleary all of whom noted the importance of "competition" among denominations. Indeed, one of Ed Cleary's edited works includes "competition" in the title - Conflict and Competition: The Latin American Church in a Changing Environment (with Hannah Stewart-Gambino). What I hope I add to the general debate is a rigorous way of looking at church-state relations in Latin America (and elsewhere) that points to some empirical evidence that may have been overlooked. What do I hope I add to the debate? Well, among other things: 1) changes in mindsets (e.g., conservative to progressive Catholicism) are often provoked by external events (e.g., Protestant growth among the poor); 2) the Protestant challenge started in some countries much earlier than is typically thought, and the Catholic Church did react to these challenges in a variety of ways; 3) Protestant growth is not merely the result of a grave cultural crisis in society, but often has much to do with changes in government regulations that make it easier to proselytize. (Additional research and findings available on request.) Do I adequately make a case for these assertions? That is up for you to decide.

By way of a final note, I enjoyed this intellectual interchange as it was very instructive and stimulating for me. I hope to have further such interactions in the future. Please feel free to contact me with any additional questions and/or comments.