Bounded rationality and politics

248 Pages·2010·1.211 MB·English

by  Simon, Herbert Alexander, Bendor, Jonathan B.

Bounded Rationality
and Politics
Jonathan Bendor
UNIVERSITYOFCALIFORNIAPRESS
Berkeley · LosAngeles · London
Bounded Rationality and Politics
THE AARON WILDAVSKY FORUM FOR PUBLIC POLICY
EditedbyLeeFriedman
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aaron wildavsky, 1930–1993
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5. GodlyRepublic:ACentristCivicBlueprintforAmerica’sFaith-BasedFuture,
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6. BoundedRationalityandPolitics,byJonathanBendor
Bounded Rationality
and Politics
Jonathan Bendor
UNIVERSITYOFCALIFORNIAPRESS
Berkeley · LosAngeles · London
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Boundedrationalityandpolitics/byJonathanBendor...[etal.].
p. cm.—(TheAaronWildavskyforumforpublicpolicy;6)
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
isbn978-0-520-25946-1(cloth:alk.paper)
isbn978-0-520-25947-8(pbk.:alk.paper)
1. Decision making—Political aspects. 2. Simon, Herbert A.
(Herbert Alexander), 1916–2001. 3. Organizational behavior—
Political aspects. 4. Social sciences—Philosophy. I. Bendor,
JonathanB.
BF441.B645 2010
320.01(cid:2)9—dc22 2009052478
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Contents
ListofFigures ix
Preface xi
1. Introduction 1
JonathanBendor
2. HerbertA.Simson:PoliticalScientist 11
JonathanBendor
3. Satisficing:APrettyGoodHeuristic 48
JonathanBendor,SunilKumar,andDavidA.Siegel
4. AModelofMuddlingThrough 61
JonathanBendor
5. ThePerfectIstheEnemyoftheBest:AdaptiveversusOptimal
OrganizationalReliability 93
JonathanBendorandSunilKumar
6. GarbageCanTheory 119
JonathanBendor,TerryMoe,andKenShotts
7. InstitutionsandIndividuals 163
JonathanBendor
Notes 183
References 207
Index 225
Figures
1.Cognitivelyconstraineddecisionmaking. 37
2.Probabilitytransitionmatrix. 69
3.Stochasticimprovement. 70
4.Mean-preservingspread. 74
5.Therelativesuperiorityofdifferentsearchstrategies. 80
6.TheprobabilitytransitionmatrixoftheMarkovprocess. 105
7.Thepurelyincrementalprocess. 109
8.Thesimulation’sninestructuralvariants. 136
9.Anunsegmented-unsegmentedorganizationfacingalightload. 138
10.Anunsegmented-unsegmentedorganizationfacingamediumload. 139
11.Anunsegmented-unsegmentedorganizationfacingaheavyload. 141
12.Thecommitteeanditspolicyspace. 159
13.Simplemyopicvoting. 159
14.Theprocesswithfixedparticipation. 160
15.Theprocesswithfluidparticipation. 162
ix