Rational self-interest calculation presupposes a defined identity

Evidence

The affective bond becomes more central whenever the combinatorial/symbolic dimension of language operates less automatically. From this perspective, affect is absolutely crucial in explaining the operation of the substitutive/paradigmatic pole of language, which is more freely associative in its workings (and thus more open to psychoanalytic exploration). As we have seen, equivalential logic is decisive in the formation of popular identities, and in these substitutive/equivalential operations the imbrication of signification and affect is most fully visible. This is the dimension that, as we recall, early theoreticians of mass society saw as most problematic, and involving a major threat to social rationality. And in contemporary rationalist reconstructions of social sciences, from structuralism to rational choice, this is also the pole that is systematically demoted at the expense of the combinatorial/symbolic one, which allows for a ‘grammatical’ or ‘logical’ calculation. — Ernesto Laclau, On Populist Reason, 448 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Pure rational self-interest cannot explain founding a derivatives exchange; Self-interest is redefined by whatever level the collective self-categorisation occupies — John Drury, The role of social identity processes…, 50; Narrow self-interest does not automatically produce efficient exchange (+7 more)

Broader Connections

• Rationalist social science systematically demotes affect in identity formation. #complicates (0.79) — Ernesto Laclau, On Populist Reason, 448