Motivation

Nick: I really enjoyed reading this paper. The one thing I wished for was a somewhat more thorough discussion of what fun is (this may not be amenable to a clear-cut definition, but perhaps a brief phenomenology of fun might be doable). Particularly, I wondered what the relationship is between fun and play, fun and affect, fun and neurological markers of pleasure, and fun and irony (as a destabilizing force, particularly as articulated by Paul de Man).

Jason: I am writing on a topic that overlaps heavily with yours. Regarding first generation reforms, what exactly do you mean by turnout? Do laws prohibiting felons from voting not, on your account, affect turnout? What about systematic discrimination by polling workers against black voters (e.g. Florida)? Regarding the effect of mail in elections, is it just more voters in low salience elections and just the same voters in high salience elections? Or is it different voters? Regarding encouraging more voters to join parties, is this confusing causation and correlation? That is, is the fact that they’re independents just an sign that they’re less likely to vote or is it actually a cause? I think it’s worth being concerned about the possibility that trying to boost voting by increasing party loyalty might have unintended consequences on other aspects of democracy (like deliberation). Regarding effect of approbation of voting by publishing names, might this effect be limited to what you describe as low salience elections (where there are a relatively small number of fairly homogenous constituents voting for a representative)?

Erin: I think some of Bernie Harcourt’s data might be interesting to incorporate. See http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/15/opinion/15harcourt.html?_r=1&oref=slogin; there’s also a paper on SSRN. One question that I had is how much prisoners are restricted from developing the sort of capabilities described by Deci and Ryan in the status quo. I think that there are ways that prisoners often figure out how to do this (by getting jobs in prison, acquiring legal education and pursing criminal appeals and/or civil lawsuits, and forming, joining and leading gangs come to mind).

Vanessa: I’d like to see a bit more discussion of what it would mean for manhood to not be precarious? Would it be seen as a purely biological phenomenon? Would this be something system design should aim at?

I just realized that people were posting their comments here. I printed your drafts out and wrote directly on the papers themselves, planning to give you my comments in class (and let you keep my comments). But if I have time to copy my comments from the hard copies to the blog before class, I will.

Hey Nick, Vanessa, Jason and Erin,

Thanks for the great read and interesting ideas! I have to say that reading your papers is really helping me think of my own in a more structured way. I will try and be as brief as possible.

Nick

– In advance, let me apologize if I misconstrue your argument. There were a lot of ideas in your paper and I may not have gotten everything straight.

– I agree with Steven and Erin that cleaning up your definition of fun would be helpful. Instinctively, I don’t agree with defining fun as “restlessness in the midst of prosperity.” I haven’t read Tocqueville but the “cycle of acquisition and divestment” that you describe seems decidedly un-fun-like, at least when done for its own sake. I’m not sure consumerism is necessarily fun, for example, maybe it’s a pursuit of fun?

– It may appear in your draft, but I think our readings on what drives intrinsic motivation – autonomy, competence, and relatedness – may help inform your theory of fun

– I don’t have any other legal examples for you and I think the ones you have a really great. Although I know you are trying to focus on legal interventions, you may want to look at the corporate world to see how they try to make work fun.

Vanessa

– I am very intrigued by the idea of a patriarchal public goods problem although I’m not sure whether I agree with the idea of precarious manhood. Not because that section isn’t thorough and convincing, I just have a prior commitment to an opposing belief. Namely, that I think a lot of female behavior may be driven by concerns of losing one’s femininity. The difference may be that a woman may have less control over whether people see her as feminine or not, where as your paper suggests, men do have control over how masculine they are thought of.

– My basic issue with the public goods problem is that it is not so clear to me that policing other men’s behavior is really an altruistic act. This circles back to an idea we have been discussing all semester as to how remote does the benefit of a particular, costly action have to be in order to describe that action as altruistic. In the case of the “gender police” I would think the benefit is pretty immediate because putting down homosexuals or women promotes you as a man directly and only reinforces ideas of masculinity remotely.

Jason

– I know very little about voter turn-out, so your paper was very interesting. Like the other posters, I was intrigued by your description of independent voters. Is a better description of an independent voter a “likely non-voter”?

– I’m not sure that the corporate donations analogy to publicizing gifts holds because, in many cases, the purpose of donating is for people to know you have donated. Your paper argues that people vote primarily as a sense of civic duty or altruism (rather than the idea that they want a government who cares only about their interests), as such, I’m not sure people would be so interested in broadcasting the fact they voted. It would seem somewhat self-serving, especially if it’s an opt-in process rather than an opt-out. But that’s just my instinctual reaction.

– If you are looking for other interventions or more information to fine-tune your interventions (not that any is needed, I think you have a good variety of options), the strategies political campaigns employ to increase or suppress voter turn-out may be an interesting lead. Perhaps another way to improve voter turn-out is to encourage more parties and force some diversity in viewpoints between the parties in order to make it more difficult for people to sit on the fence

Erin

– Thank you for the great overview of prison ideologies. I’m not sure whether it would be outside the scope of your paper, but I wonder how prisoners currently meet the psychological needs in Deci and Ryn’s framework. It would seem that the challenge prisons face is not instilling a sense of self-determination in prisoners, but aligning the methods in which they get a sense of competence, autonomy and relatedness with the values of society.

– You address the fact that society may consider prisoners as non-contributors. I wonder if the separation may even be stronger than that and society considers prisoners as not even members of a common community – as shown by their length of incarceration. Perhaps an ideology that helps make society more inclusive would facilitate reforms.

Like others, I focused in on the partisanship-independence piece. There was one bit which I found potentially problematic: you suggest that in closed-primary states there will be greater partisanship, because an individual benefits from picking a party by being able to vote in the primary, however you are also suggesting that partisanship is one of the things that increases likelihood to vote, whereas independents are less likely to vote. This may prove to be a bit of a chicken/egg problem, because desire to vote in the primary is what is supposed to encourage the independents to pick a party, but picking a party is then supposed to be what encourages the (former) independents to vote.

Knowing absolutely nothing about this topic, I’m sure there’s a whole lot that I’m missing — but I do think (as others suggested) that fleshing out what motivates people to register as independent may be helpful.

Sorry in advance for an uncommonly long post. I hope these ideas are helpful, and I look forward to discussion tonight.

Jason’s Paper

In your paper, you address the connection between partisanship and voter turnout, explaining that partisan loyalty makes people more likely to vote. The parallels between this and Deci & Ryan’s self-determination theory may be helpful: to the extent that partisan loyalty fosters a sense of relatedness, it is likely to stimulate intrinsic motivations to vote. The experiments Professor Benkler has described (though I can’t recall reading at this point) about two groups asked to perform a task, with the only difference between them being that one was told, “you’re a team,” and the “team” group consistently outperforming the other group also seems helpful.

You ask for ideas to increase partisan loyalty on page 26. I think you might be better off identifying what might be going on with regard to self-determination theory and instead asking what could increase a sense of relatedness. Maybe this means more “teams” in the form of more parties. Maybe it means forcing voters to register with a party, rather than allowing them to register as independent (query whether this might have negative autonomy effects, and whether a proliferation of available teams could combat them). Another alternative is competitive districting in a different sense than Isaacharoff might suggest: have more polling locations, distributed on a neighborhood basis, and publicize the neighborhoods with the highest turnouts as a percentage of their population. This would avoid the problems associated with a list of names of voters, and because it taps into potentially developed “teams” (preexisting neighborhoods), it might help foster relatedness is ways that the names list could not.

Vanessa’s Paper

Most of your paper at this point is dedicated to exposing the concept of “precarious manhood,” and while I found this very interesting, I am not in a position to offer you much in the form of helpful feedback in these parts of your paper.

I can address the fledgling arguments between 14 and 16, but I hope that my comments are not based on a misunderstanding of your project here in its early stages. My main question, which is related to Jason’s, is what precisely this “patriarchal public goods problem” consists in (p. 14). I take it that a public good has the following characteristics: a group (here, society?) and each individual within it benefits from individual contributions to the public good, but the returns to each individual are less than the cost of contribution, and thus we expect public goods to be underproduced (or not produced at all) on a selfish rational actor (SRA) model. But in this case, what is the contribution that is costly to a man but beneficial to men or society in general? Even if gender performance is costly to A, A will on an SRA model perform gender is the benefits to A of such performance outweigh the costs, even if performance has positive externalities that accrue to the benefit of society at large and not specifically to A. I think that gender for performance, for men, might be just this kind of good. To the extent that this is true, the SRA does most of the work, and there is no public goods problem. I imagine that I misunderstand either what you mean by public goods problem here, or that I misunderstand the costs and benefits of gender performance. I suggest, therefore, that you carefully explain how these concepts interact in the patriarchal public goods game.

Erin’s Paper

I found your paper lucid and helpful, particularly for those with little background on various theories of punishment. Criminal punishment systems welcome applications of basically all of the areas of scholarship we discussed this semester, so your topic is a fertile one indeed.

I will focus my comments on the aspect of your paper I am most competent to help you think about: ideology. I think your paper could benefit from sharpening your use of ideology, and in particular explaining why you characterize what might typically be thought of as “moral theories of punishment” instead as “ideologies.” Typical characteristics I tend to think of when I see “ideology” include: framing/lenses/images through which the world is characterized (Fisher on Sambos, for example), self-justificatory force (Geertz on the distinction between science and ideology), justification of an underlying social order (Marx/Gramsci), and resistance to “choice” or “change” (e.g., MacKinnon). Several conclusions seem to follow from this set of characteristics. Pertinent to your paper, I wonder whether one would criticize ideologies (as you suggest “criticisms of the ideology of retribution” on p. 9) for their policy recommendations, as one would perhaps with moral theories. If ideology is a set of frames through which we see the world, it would seem much more natural to criticize how our pictures are thus false or misleading. Similarly, I wonder what it means to say (as you do on p. 12) that “ideological goals are not met”: to the extent that an ideology is successful at becoming an ideology, its goals are met. In other words, at least on some accounts, the “purpose” of an ideology is justification of itself and/or the underlying “base.” Slave ideology had the goal of perpetuating the master/slave division within an otherwise liberal legal tradition—it’s not really a criticism of an ideology per se to say that the liberal tradition cannot be liberal within a system of slavery. Indeed, ideology’s greatest triumph may be in justifying through framing that which seems unjustifiable. Finally, I wonder whether we can meaningfully “choose” an ideological framework, as you suggest we should at p. 15. All of this is to say that I think you should sharpen your use of the term ideology, since it can take many forms, of which we discussed at least a few in seminar.

Nick’s Paper

A fun paper indeed. I can’t think of any legal work that I’ve read incorporating much fun into its analysis, so I take it that your project is a novel one, which is an excellent start. I think I’m going to agree that, given the centrality of “fun” to your paper, you really have to sharpen the meaning you attribute to it. This will have consequences for all of the social science work you put it to.

For example, you say that fun is “a prime intrinsic motivator.” (p. 2) I wonder whether it really is an intrinsic motivator, and whether it is depends largely on what it is. On p. 6, you distinguish fun from “happiness,” but I wonder whether fun is not just part of a utility calculus that we’d expect from a rational actor. In other words, perhaps people seek to maximize utility, which is a package of various goods including money, happiness, fun, and the like. If this is the case, then the selfish rational actor model predicts that people will want to maximize fun. But you seem to suggest that fun is something different, just as Deci and Ryan would say that self-determination is different. I take it that what makes self-determination different is something like incommensurability, i.e., autonomy cannot be valued in absolute dollars or even along a ordinal, ranked scale. But even if fun is distinct from happiness, my intuition is that it is more like happiness than like autonomy in the sense that we would feel comfortable monetizing fun. To explain why I am wrong (as I likely am), you will have to give a robust account of precisely what fun is.

*If anyone wants more detailed comments or for me to look at another draft, please let me know*

Nick’s Paper

What is your operating definition of “fun”? You say, ‘alternatively collaborative and competitive actor with a preference for fun and with strong beliefs and constraints emerging from the context in which such collaboration and competition occurs.” By the end of your piece I was left with the feeling that “fun” as you describe it, is a somewhat iterative process that requires a person interacting with others in a relatively unstructured environment, which might explain why collaborative work and competitive sports may be amusing, but maybe not fun in the sense that you use. Is there anyway to bring the conversational interactive elements to the fore earlier on in your article?

Given your initial discussion of Jefferson and de Tocqueville, it might be worth comparing this acquisitive fun with a philosophy like hedonism, pleasure as the highest good.

In the Legislative section, you give the DMCA provision, but then quote from the CDA for your next section. Is the CDA so complicated or poorly organized that it makes more sense not to cite it directly?

A most enjoyable read!

Jason’s Paper

Is there anyone out there who argues that low voter turnout might actually be a positive in that it shows that people accept/support the status quo? Are there differences in how people vote in times of public stress, unrest as opposed to times of tranquility? (This seems slightly different than a private/public interest argument like Posner’s.) Of course, you argue that the status quo skews elections in favor of the economically advantaged so it may not be something you see as a positive.

Your section on the social norm research was fascinating. You question whether you should address the “myth of the independent voter.” I’m not entirely sure what that is, but if increased party affiliation leads to more voting, then going more into independents and what factors they use in self-identification would be useful. Is there a chance that issue identification rather than party identification will have a similar effect? Issue-specific initiatives have long been key to partisan voting (anti-abortion = R; pro-welfare = D). Maybe greater targeting by parties to specific areas on specific issues would increase turnout? Though in an age of technology, the targeting might be perceived as disingenuous.

I notice throughout this section that affiliation seems like a key determinant of voting. We discussed this concept quite a bit in a course I took last semester on emotions in negotiation, so let me know if you’d like to hear more about it (though I’m not sure you need to deal with it much further).

Do you discuss the social norm created when people have the day off work to vote? This may not be an effective strategy given other countries’ results, but having a day that is exclusively devoted to voting would be a strong statement that the state encourages people to vote. There may be structures – like paid day off – that would be interesting to examine. Would paid day off help encourage poorer groups to vote or would the money crowd out the motivation to vote? Would it discourage voting if you only got the day off if you voted and had to forfeit your salary if you didn’t?

Very thorough look at the social norms of voting; this is great so far.

Vanessa’s Paper

Your discussion of the psychosocial literature is extensive, and the biological feels like more of an afterthought. Given your excellent discussion of the studies in one realm, it might be worth delving more into the biological, or at least explaining why it’s not as relevant or helpful to the goals of your article.

In the altruistic punishment model you begin to set up, are you assuming that the actors in the model are all men? Maybe this is a gendered assumption on my part, but by labeling altruistic punishers as “bullies,” it sounds like women are not punishers (though this isn’t necessarily the case based on what you said, just my impression). How do women fit into this model?

Your discussion of men who have already established their manhood put me in mind of Dennis Rodman. Not that he’s using gender norms in a positive way, but he may be an example of flexibility once hyper-masculinity has been established.

I’m looking forward to talking about this one today!

Nick,

Interesting, creative take on the issue of the law and creative and scientific progress. I had a few comments. I was wondering if there was a more robust definition of “fun” to work with. In many places you define it against something else (e.g., happiness), and I’m not always clear about the working definition you adopt. That said, at times your idea of happiness has some parallels with Nancy Rosenblum’s “law of the heart.” See Nancy L. Rosenblum, Another Liberalism. I’m TFing for Rosenblum this semester and read her chapter on the “law of the heart” for that class. Basically, it is the principle that people act spontaneously with regard to their feelings and without regard for legalistic constraints or other people. She doesn’t endorse it but just introduces it as an anti-legal principle. Anyway, it may be worth mentioning in relation to your conception of fun.

Erin,

A comprehensive paper on a topic that you clearly know a lot about. I certainly learned a lot reading it. A couple points. Your paper operates from the normative assumption that “rehabilitation” is a superior ideology. If people don’t buy that assumption, then much of the paper is lost to them. So perhaps in your discussion on the three ideologies you could say a little more about why rehabilitation is the better ideology.

In your discussion on access to courts, you make some interesting points. However, I found the part on proportionate justice in sentencing a bit distracting. That’s a huge subject, and I wasn’t sure how much work it was doing here. You’re on much stronger ground when your discussion revolves around the idea that access to courts matter in so far as courts embrace rehabilitation as a guiding principle on issues. Overall, a meaty, interesting discussion.

Vanessa,

You draw from a fascinating literature. I surprised a friend of mine yesterday with the sentences about once being a man/woman and now having changed. One thing that ran across my mind on the issue of altruistic punishment. It may be difficult to tell when this is actually occurring because the act of “punishing” here is an act of masculinity – flexing one’s muscles so to speak. So along the relevant metric, the punisher may always – or at least often – stand to gain by appearing more masculine and establishing his place on the masculine pecking order. Does that make sense?

I think most of the questions I had about this week’s excerpt is where culture fits into a revision of the legal system that emphasizes cooperation. There are legal concepts that are culturally-based and unrelated to the selfish/cooperative actor debate that are likely to limit a cooperative approach to shaping legal systems. For example, when I read about the transparency/reputation leverage, I wondered how such an approach would fit in with a desire to maintain privacy.

I also think that the emphasis on individualism has roots that are deeper than the economic and scientific models that have given rise to the idea of selfishness. For example, the idea of rugged American individualism probably stems from other factors than Social Darwinism. While you can contradict scientific models with science, I do not think that sociological or anthropological studies can really alter our conceptions of who we are. 

I also wonder whether suggesting that certain actions/processes are undertaken to advance cooperation frames them in a more positive light than they deserve. Reading about the “new psychological contract” and “affective commitment” (concepts which reminded me of the Weber reading from last week) I couldn’t help that think that characterizing the move from life-long employment to employability as a move from competing to cooperating suggests that the later model is better or more progressive when there are costs and benefits to both employment models.

I’m sure that many of these issues will be addressed in the full version of Professor Benkler’s book.