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ABSTRACT
A recent line of argument insists that replacing democracy with markets would improve social decision making due to markets’ superior use of knowledge. These arguments are flawed by unrealistic assumptions, unfair comparisons, and a neglect of the epistemic limits of markets. In reality, the epistemic advantages of markets over democracy are circumscribed and often illusory. A recognition of markets’ epistemic limits can, however, provide guidance for designing institutions in ways that capture the advantages of both.
Notes
1 This raises the question of whether there will be a group of citizens concerned about every issue, as well as of whether the boundaries of issues can be defined meaningfully (Somin Citation2013, 106). These are real problems that can be solved by means of deliberation. It would be fatuous to claim that there are citizens vigilantly attending to every conceivable issue. But free political discussion allows for new issues to become better known and for political entrepreneurs to make discursive connections between issues and interests, generating attention for issues from existing groups who come to understand why they should care about them. The boundaries of each issue are those that emerge from social and political discussion of it, reflecting contemporary social and political understandings. Such definitions are never complete or unanimous and must always be contestable but, at any given time, typically provide sufficient guidance for practical purposes.
2 Zaller’s conclusion that the ANES should continue using general knowledge surveys was driven by considerations of methodology and cost, not exact truth. His task was to decide whether it was worth ANES investing in an issue-specific knowledge survey; he concluded that the returns would not be large enough to justify the added length and cost such items would entail—at least with 1986 technology. (Today the cost would be trivial; one could use a computerized branching survey that asked citizens which issues they habitually pay attention to or think are important, and then ask knowledge questions about them.) Surveys designed to assess general political knowledge have helped cement it as the only possible conceptualization of political knowledge.
3 DeCanio is coy in never explicitly putting markets forward as an alternative to democracy (except perhaps in his last sentence), yet he structures his entire argument around such a comparison (DeCanio Citation2014). This is apparent in his pairing of epistemically problematic features of political decisions with corresponding positive features of markets. Somin is not so careful and explicitly advocates leaving many more decisions to “foot voting in the private sector,” as he calls market decision making (Somin Citation2013, 135). Pennington targets many of his comparisons at the “state” and only some against democracy (Pennington Citation2011). For more on Somin, see the symposium on his book in volume 27, nos. 3-4 of this journal and his response to the symposium (Somin Citation2015). For Pennington, see the symposium in volume 28, nos. 3-4, and Pennington’s response (Pennington Citation2016).
4 Pennington advocates a “robust political economy” approach to designing political economic institutions which is premised upon accepting precisely these kinds of deviations from the ideal conditions of neoclassical economic theory (Pennington Citation2011). Such an approach would be less susceptible to the main critique in this section.