Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-vdxz6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T20:56:39.807Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Rational Choice and Biopolitics: A (Darwinian) Tale of Two Theories

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Albert Somit  and
Steven A. Peterson
Albert Somit
Affiliation:
Southern Illinois University
Steven A. Peterson
Affiliation:
Pennsylvania State University, Harrisburg
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

In a recent paper (Somit and Peterson 1998), we discussed the relative successes and failures of “biopolitics” since it emerged as an identifiable subfield within political science during the mid-1960s (see also Degler 1991). Toward that end, we addressed two questions. First, we assessed the extent to which biopolitics has established itself organizationally as a field within the parent discipline. Second, and substantively surely more important, we measured the extent to which evolutionary concepts and the methods and research questions of the biological sciences have been incorporated within mainstream political science.

Although obviously interrelated, these are clearly quite distinct issues. The resulting balance sheet, we reluctantly concluded, makes at best bittersweet reading.

Type
Research Article
Information
PS: Political Science & Politics , Volume 32 , Issue 1 , March 1999 , pp. 39 - 44
Copyright
Copyright © The American Political Science Association 1999

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Almond, Gabriel A. 1997. “Political Science: The History of the Discipline.” In A New Handbook of Political Science, ed. Goodin, Robert E. and Klingemann, Hans-Dieter. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Barash, David P. 1994. “State Behavior, Individual Behavior, and the Legacy of Biology in a Troubled World.” Politics and the Life Sciences 13(February): 15–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyd, Robert, and Silk, Joan B. 1997. How Humans Evolved. New York: W.W. Norton.Google Scholar
Dawkins, Richard. 1976. The Selfish Gene. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Degler, Carl. 1991. In Search of Human Nature. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Dennett, Daniel C. 1995. Darwin's Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings in Life. New York: Simon and Schuster.Google Scholar
Frank, Robert. 1988. Passions within Reason: The Strategic Role of Emotions. New York: W.W. Norton.Google Scholar
Goodin, Robert, and Klingemann, Hans-Dieter, eds. 1997. A New Handbook of Political Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Grafstein, Robert. 1997. “Comment.” Journal of Politics 59(November): 1040–1047.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Green, D.P., and Shapiro, Ian. 1994. Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Hamilton, W.D. 1964. “The Genetical Evolution of Social Behavior.” Journal of Theoretical Biology 7(January): 1–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hines, Samuel M. Jr. 1982. “Biopolitics and the Evolution of Inquiry in Political Science.” Politics and the Life Sciences 1(July): 5–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kingdom, Jonathan. 1993. Self-Made Man: Evolution from Eden. New York: John Wiley.Google Scholar
Lalman, David, Oppenheimer, Joe, and Swistak, Piotr. 1993. “Formal Rational Choice Theory.” In Political Science: The State of the Discipline II, ed. Finifter, Ada W.. Washington, DC: American Political Science Association.Google Scholar
Lowery, Robert C., and Silver, Brian D. 1996. “A Rising Tide Lifts All Boats: Political Science Departments' Reputations and the Reputation of the University.” PS: Political Science and Politics 29(June): 161–67.Google Scholar
Peterson, Steven A. 1993. “Harold D. Lasswell.” In American Political Scientists: A Dictionary, ed. Utter, Glenn H. and Lockhart, Charles. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.Google Scholar
Somit, Albert, ed. 1976. Biology and Politics. Paris: Mouton.Google Scholar
Somit, Albert, and Peterson, Steven A.. 1990. Biopolitics and Mainstream Political Science: A Master Bibliography. DeKalb, IL: Program for Biosocial Research.Google Scholar
Somit, Albert, eds. 1994. Biopolitics and the Mainstream: Contributions of Biology to Political Science. Greenwich, CT: JAI Press.Google Scholar
Somit, Albert, eds. 1997. Darwinism, Dominance, and Democracy: The Biological Bases of Authoritarianism. Westport, CT: Praeger.Google Scholar
Somit, Albert, eds. 1998. “Biopolitics after Three Decades—A Balance Sheet.” British Journal of Political Science 28(July): 559–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trivers, Robert L. 1971. “The Evolution of Reciprocal Altruism.” The Quarterly Review of Biology 46(March): 35–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
von Beyme, Klaus. 1997. “Political Theory: Empirical Political Theory.” In A New Handbook of Political Science, eds. Goodin, Robert E. and Klingemann, Hand-Dieter. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Wahlke, John. 1979. “Pre-Behavioralism in Political Science.” American Political Science Review 73(March): 9–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weigele, Thomas C. 1979. Biopolitics: Toward a More Human Political Science. Boulder: Westview Press.Google Scholar
Williams, George C. 1966. Adaptation and Natural Selection. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Wilson, Edward O. 1975. Sociobiology. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Yee, Albert S. 1997. “Thick Rationality and the Missing ‘Brute’ Fact: The Limits of Rationalist Incorporation of Norms and Ideas.” Journal of Politics 59(November): 1001–1039.CrossRefGoogle Scholar