Private Truths, Public Lies: The Social Consequences of Preference FalsificationPreference falsification, according to the economist Timur Kuran, is the act of misrepresenting one's wants under perceived social pressures. It happens frequently in everyday life, such as when we tell the host of a dinner party that we are enjoying the food when we actually find it bland. In Private Truths, Public Lies Kuran argues convincingly that the phenomenon not only is ubiquitous but has huge social and political consequences. Drawing on diverse intellectual traditions, including those rooted in economics, psychology, sociology, and political science, Kuran provides a unified theory of how preference falsification shapes collective decisions, orients structural change, sustains social stability, distorts human knowledge, and conceals political possibilities. |
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... ( Cambridge : Cambridge University Press , 1982 ) ; and Geoffrey Brennan and Loren Lomasky , " The Impartial Spectator Goes to Washington : Toward a Smithian Theory of Electoral Behavior , " Economics and Philosophy , 1 ( October 1985 ) ...
... ( Cambridge : Cambridge University Press , 1989 ) , chap . 9 ; and James S. Coleman , Foundations of Social Theory ( Cam- bridge , Mass .: Harvard University Press , 1990 ) , especially chaps . 10–12 . 4. Herbert A. Simon , Reason in ...
... ( Cambridge : Cambridge University Press , 1979 ) . Another influential structural theory is the " demographic / structural theory " of Jack A. Goldstone , Revolution and Rebellion in the Early Modern World ( Berkeley : University of ...
Contents
Collective Conservatism | 105 |
The Obstinacy of Communism | 118 |
The Ominous Perseverance of the Caste System | 128 |
Copyright | |
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