ABSTRACT OF PAPER
Title: When Homo Economicus Met Homo Ethicus: Altruism and Beyond, 1975-1993
Author: Fontaine Philippe
In an earlier paper devoted to the period from the early 1960s to the mid-1970s, I have shown that research on seemingly unselfish behavior underwent a renewal under the impulse of a study of philanthropy in the American society between 1959 and 62. The gradual structuration of unselfishness research produced a variety of outcomes among which the invariance proposition and the “ ‘rotten kid’ theorem” are perhaps the most obvious exemplars. When it is remembered, however, that economists have mostly studied seemingly unselfish behavior by allowing for sympathetic preferences within the self-interest model—in economics parlance, that is what “altruism” usually means—it may be wondered whether clarification has been added concerning behavioral motivations in the process. The question is worth asking if only because from the very renewal of unselfishness research in the early 1960s, many voices have risen to argue that seemingly unselfish behavior cannot be dealt with satisfactorily within the self-interest model. The presente paper considers the development of unselfishness research from 1975 to 1993. The significance of past work is not derived from its posterior theoretical recognition. Instead, drawing on archival material and oral history, the present study addresses historical questions: Why has the study of unselfish behavior remained topical throughout that period? What were the historical stakes, if any? What were the main protagonists trying to achieve? How did they deal with the subject? Why did they get involved in it? Did work on altruism mean the same thing to all of them?
Registred web users only can download this paper - Go back
Please note that files available for download have not been checked for viruses. These files have been submitted by authors of the conference to this web site. Conference organisers can't accept any responsibility for damages caused to users by downloading such files.