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When and why Conventions cannot Be Social Institutions

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Abstract

The paper focuses on the issue of compatibility of social institution and convention. At first, it introduces the modest account of conventionality building on five distinctive features – interdependence, arbitrariness, mind-independence, spontaneity, and normative-neutrality – which constitute conventional behaviour, then it presents the two major theories of social institutions that explain them in terms of rules, or equilibria. The argument is that conventions cover a wide-ranging area and cannot be identified with the category of institutions because it would be too restrictive and contradictory to the initial modest account.

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Notes

  1. To avoid an obvious criticism, I would like to add that this “spreading out” is based on social transmission due to precedent (Millikan 2005, 2014). Therefore, it is not a genetically encoded social practice, such as bees dancing, or ants coordinating their paths by hormones.

  2. Here, I agree with those who claim that a conventional behaviour does not imply any normative powers. This tradition goes back to Lewis (1969) who carefully distinguished conventions from norms and rules, similarly Millikan (2005) and Bicchieri (2006). Therefore, and I will argue for this later, I cannot agree with the strictly normative view of conventions, proposed by Ullmann-Margalit (2015) or Gilbert (2008), because their focus is overly narrow.

  3. For instance, Knoblich et al. (2011) make a useful distinction between planned and emergent coordination and also provide an overview of the relevant literature in psychology.

  4. For the lack of space, I do not discuss all the essential parts of Gilbert’s view in depth, however just to mention a few: she demands common knowledge amongst people, conventional pattern depends heavily on joint commitment (Gilbert 2008, 11) and the fact that participants hold certain demand rights against each other (Gilbert 2018, chap.8).

  5. This example is mentioned by Millikan (2014, 34) to prove that simple behavioural regularities fit into the minimal view of conventionality.

  6. Therefore, I agree with those accounts that present conventional patterns in terms of a pattern that spreads out (Millikan 2005), or of the gradual accretion of precedent (Young 1996). They capture a crucial dimension of our social practices and conventions, namely the fact that social behaviour often emerges mindlessly and almost without any cognitive sophistication (such as mind-reading, normative pressure, sanctioning). In my opinion, this aspect is somewhat neglected by those who prefer the normatively-laden view of conventions.

  7. I do not appeal to the “family resemblance” concept (Wittgenstein 2009) directly, yet I have sympathy for this idea as it looks quite compelling in this situation.

  8. Although I do not address the question of whether there might be a minimal foundation of conventionality based on these features, I tried to argue for such conclusion elsewhere (Zachník 2015). In short, coordination structure (interdependence with arbitrariness) and behavioural patterns reproduced in a community might be enough.

  9. In general, this is the answer to, perhaps, an immediate objection that the project is based on the intentionally vague grounds and provides no theoretical advantages in comparison to already established approaches. Considering the recent literature, it is hard to deny the fact that young children engage in some form of coordination without having a full understanding of normativity or minds of the others (Brownell 2011, Pacherie 2013, Tollefsen 2005, Butterfill 2012, Fiebich 2019). Therefore, it is more than welcome to include these constraints into the novel approach to social conventions. Cf. Lewis (1969, 51) or Lewis (1969, 75).

  10. The account is modest only in a sense that it is compatible with the minimal cognitive abilities and normative attitudes of agents, which is quite uncontroversial on its own but strikingly neglected in the mainstream approaches.

  11. More specifically, I mean the strategic aspect of interdependence based on individual preferences, not the fact that every agent can form an expectation regarding other player’s behaviour. Because an outcome could be a result of interdependence or coincidence of our desires without the involvement of any mind-reading abilities.

  12. The expression „viable alternative “is a bit vague here. A solution and its alternatives must be Nash equilibria, i.e., no one can change her action to be better off; and players’ preferences, at least in some point, coincide. There are many possible ways how the preferences may coincide, Camerer (2003, chap. 7) offers an overview of various games with an aspect of coordination (or common interests games).

  13. See Muldoon et al. (2014) or Knoblich et al. (2011).

  14. This idea would deserve a more in-depth analysis and commentary section beyond the scope of the paper. See, for example, Vesper et al. (2010) and their idea of coordination smoothers.

  15. Let me remind you just a few examples of these minimal conventional patterns, such as spontaneous greeting patterns of children, a distance we keep in communication, clapping hands at the jazz concert after the solo of each member of the band, or eating with colleagues in the same restaurant on Mondays.

  16. I will analyse the relationship between the coordination game and interdependence and arbitrariness in the next section. However, it is important to keep in mind that a coordination rule does not have to be an equilibrium. Some proponents of this view usually assume this conclusion without any further argument.

  17. Some might be wondering why I do not discuss John Searle’s version of constitutive rules (Searle 1995, 2011) but I am strongly convinced that his idea goes even more against my view of conventionality. Moreover, there is a quite appealing argument that constitutive rules are nothing more than regulative rules (or what I call just “rules”) and as such, they can be reduced to them, see Hindriks and Guala (2015).

  18. Hodgson (2006, 12) uses coordination game as a key step in proving that rules emerge spontaneously, which is the other aspect of conventionality that is interesting to follow here. And North (1990, 41) relies on coordination to defend self-enforcing rules, but his description is vague and does not explain a lot.

  19. In literature, there are striking differences amongst authors who focus on the relationship between rule and convention. Here, I hold the “lewiasian” position because I consider behavioural regularities as fundamental ground for the description of conventional phenomena, whereas rule is an extension or supplementary factor that might be added to the already-existing conventional behaviour. Cf. Lewis (1969) with Gilbert (1989a) and Ullmann-Margalit (2015).

  20. Compare with Guala (2013) and his experiment showing that in repeated coordination agents form normative beliefs after some time.

  21. Here, I diverge with those who hold that trivial normativity generates a rule (Guala 2016, 74) because unlike them I think every rule is constituted by the regulative attitudes of individuals (i.e., by intrinsic normative content), not by the fact that there is a standard of correctness in place.

  22. Therefore, I do not deny the possibility of transformation of the one into the other. It is consistent with all I have said so far. Moreover, there is evidence in favour of a conclusion that repeated play can induce motivational normativity, see Guala (2013).

  23. The assumption that coordination game gives arise social entities is deeply rooted in the rational choice theory in general, that is, in the approach I use in this paper as well. One can track this tradition back to Schelling (1960), Lewis (1969), and Ullmann-Margalit (2015).

  24. Also, social institutions not just help us not just to select the right combinations of actions as in Driving game or in Greetings scenario, but they can create a new solution of the interaction by introducing some changes in agents’ payoffs (Bicchieri 2006; Crawford and Ostrom 1995).

  25. Nash equilibrium is a game-theoretical concept which is formally defined in the literature, for more details see Tadelis (2013), or Binmore (2012). For the sake of simplicity, I use the informal definition here.

  26. Agent’s desires are represented by the numbers as von Neumann-Morgenstern utilities, therefore they provide information how much each agent prefers a particular outcome. For details see Luce and Raiffa (1957, chap. 2), Peterson (2009), or Gaus (2007, chap. 2).

  27. In the debate on how to select one Nash equilibrium from many other possible alternatives, there is one thing in common: standard principle of instrumental rationality is not sufficient to solve this issue. However, many theories approach this problem differently, for instance by extending the rationality standards (Harsanyi and Selten 1988; Gauthier 1975), relying on novel modes of reasoning (Bacharach 2006; Camerer et al. 2004), or by salience (Sugden 1995; Bacharach and Bernasconi 1997).

  28. However, some tried to argue for a view that any equilibrium is a social institution, for instance, Sugden (1986, 34) or Binmore (2010).

  29. Imagine the situation when two players need to choose one and the same of the natural numbers, in such a game there are infinitely many equilibria.

  30. How these beliefs come about is another complex issue which is usually explained – possible due to Lewis’ influence – by invoking salience, precedent, or agreement. For more details see Lewis (1969), Mehta et al. (1994), Cubitt and Sugden (2003), Sugden (1995), Gilbert (1989b), Skyrms (1998).

  31. The idea of beliefs underpinning a strategic choice is a fundamental assumption in the standard game-theoretical models, and nowadays it is even more important in some branches of the game theory as it has become a central theme in the epistemic game theory (Perea 2012; de Bruin 2009).

  32. The importance of explicitly stating that such an alternative exists goes back to Ullmann-Margalit (2015). It is a necessary step because coincidence in preferences could in principle lead only to trivial decision problem with one dominant strategy and the unique equilibrium.

  33. Many researchers assume that social institutions exist to solve the coordination problem; most prominently Guala (2016), or Bicchieri (2006).

  34. Some might arguably claim that this literature provides an alternative explanation of the emergence of Nash equilibrium, which could be a missing piece in unifying conventions and institutions-as-equilibria. I must admit that – especially in the case of mind-independence and spontaneity – it looks like a reasonable response. In short, I am convinced that it works well with convention though in the case of institutions-as-equilibria this extension presents a very dubious idea for two reasons: institutions are generally regarded as human-specific and tied to intentionality (Guala 2016), and not every stable equilibrium is identical to a social institution.

  35. This is the way how I interpret Bicchieri (2006) when she defines different norms by employing the condition of existence, and yet she thinks norms can be triggered entirely unconsciously (e.g., as described by the script theory).

  36. Mixed motives games with a conflict give a good example, e.g., Prisoners’ dilemma game.

  37. This perspective was initiated by the Lewis (1969), a broad picture and discussion provides Amadae (2011).

  38. In more technical terms, a rational agent should maximise his expected utility function, for more details see Luce and Raiffa (1957); Peterson (2009).

  39. Some argue that normativity is needed to account for institutions-as-equilibria (Ullmann-Margalit (2015); Crawford and Ostrom 1995), but Searle (1995, 2011) for instance holds a view that deontic powers occur inherently together with institutions.

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Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Francesco Guala whose help and consultation significantly improved my paper.

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    Vojtěch Zachník

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Zachník, V. When and why Conventions cannot Be Social Institutions. Philosophia 48, 1235–1254 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-019-00125-0

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