Workshop in Decisions, Games and Logic London School of Economics, July 2007 Better than free: why autonomy favours freedom, success and self-esteem Margherita Bottero Stockholm Sch. Of Economics Joint work with Sebastiano Bavetta and Pietro Navarra introduction Idea the more “free” an agent is the better he performs in real-life tasks Aim prove this relationship by means of Autonomy as a measure of freedom Target (if relationship true) practice of economics: policy analysis and decisions background issues How to measure performances? performance = “right” sequence of actions How to measure freedom? freedom = freedom of choice metrics: Simple Cardinality Order (SCO) [Pattanaix, Xu, 1990] or Preference Order (PO) [Sen, 1991] VS Autonomy Freedom (AF) [Bavetta et alii,2000] performance process performance Action 1 Action 2 Action n Same need might be satisfied by different performances Same performance might be made up by different actions ESSENTIAL INGREDIENTS 1. actions might turn into failures 2. to succeed in the performance, each action has to be successfully completed in the right order autonomy freedom having opportunities is a necessary condition for choice (SCO and PO) …but also… choice is desirable because it fosters moral and intellectual capacities (AF [building on Mill, 1859, Berlin, 1969]) …hence… Autonomy Freedom = freedom to rule, regulate oneself; the main attraction […] is procedural in character [Bavetta, Guala, 2003] autonomy freedom Metrics: (a) axioms and ranking rules [Bavetta, Peragine, 2004] (b) “some people feel they have completely free choice and control over their lives, while other people feel that what they do has no real effect on what happens to them. Please use a ten-point scale in which 1 means none at all and 10 means a great deal to indicate how much freedom of choice and control you have over the way your life turns out” [World Value Survey] why autonomy? • Operationally better than other existing measures (SCO, PO) • Procedural • Features ground to support individual/ internal motivation and learning by doing • Compatible with Attributional theory [Heider, 1958,Rotter, 1966,Bem, 1967, Weiner et alii, 1971] why autonomy favours freedom, success and self-esteem: autonomy, actions and performances The general framework • Outcomes Vs. Achievements: a procedural difference • Course of Actions Vs. Performance autonomy, actions and performances The mechanics of the process • Motivation [Fehr, Falk, 2002, Benabou, Tirole, 2003] • Attribution theory and learning by doing remarks and extensions • Where next? Some references Bavetta and Guala. Autonomy freedom and deliberation. J. Theoret. Politics, 15:423–43, 2003. Bavetta and Guala. Opportunities and Individuality: Their Value and the Possibility of Measuring it. Mimeo, LSE. Mill. On Liberty. John W. Parker and Son, 1859. Pattanaik and Xu. On ranking opportunity sets in terms of freedom of choice. Rechérches Economiques de Louvain, 56: 383–90, 1990. Pattanaik and Xu. On preference and freedom. Th. and Dec., 44:173–98, 1998. Sen. Freedom of choice: Concept and content. Eur. Econ. Rev., 32:269–94, 1988. Sen. Welfare, preference and freedom. Jour of Econometrics, 50:15–29, 1991. Sugden. The metric of opportunity. Econ. & Phil., 14: 307–37, 1998. Sugden. Opportunity as a space for individuality: Its value and the impossibility of measuring it. Ethics, 113:783–809, 2003.