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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... opposition , and on x , his private preference . Given that his incentive to support the opposition varies directly with Ye and inversely with x , there is a crit- ical value of Ye at which he will abandon the government for the opposition ...
... opposition . This explosive growth in the size of public opposition represents a revolution . Small Events , Large Outcomes The analysis could be carried on through diagrams.1 The key points can be developed more simply , however ...
... opposition movements elsewhere , a few thousand people stood up in defiance , joining the tiny core of long - persecuted activists . In so doing they encouraged additional citizens to drop their masks , which then impelled more ...
Contents
Collective Conservatism | 105 |
The Obstinacy of Communism | 118 |
The Ominous Perseverance of the Caste System | 128 |
Copyright | |
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