In everyday life, there are many times we act
opportunistically and many times we decide not to despite having the chance to.
Our decision whether to act opportunistically or not could be due to many
reasons, for example not wanting to act unethically by taking advantage of
others or taking advantage of the situation you may be in. There may even be
several reasons for not acting opportunistically even when given the chance.
An example of when I had the chance to act
opportunistically but decided not to was when I had the chance to take answers
for an assignment for a class from one of my friends who was taking the same class
with me during my first year. Since I was struggling to complete this
assignment, I thought I should ask him to send me his answers since the
assignment was due the same night. I had the chance to act opportunistically in this situation because I knew that he would say yes since we were friends, and
I would have been taking advantage of him in that way. Finally, though, I
decided not to act opportunistically in this scenario and did not ask him for
his answers. However, my decision to not act opportunistically in this scenario
was not based solely on one reason or decision. One reason I decided not to ask
him for his answers and copy them was because it was unethical, but what
affected my decision more significantly was the fact that I did not want him to
get caught for cheating because he tried to help me.
An example of when someone I know had the chance to
act opportunistically but he/she decided not to was when a friend of mine
thought about stealing some snacks from a store a couple years ago. He finally
decided not to because it was unethical but more importantly, he thought that
if he got caught then there would be harsh consequences. Similarly to why I
decided not to act opportunistically, he decided to act in this manner because
of several reasons, the main one being consequences, but also partly due to the
ethical implications, religious reasons (in other words, wanting to be a good
person) and the fact that the food was not worth much.
Our decisions about whether we act opportunistically
or not are not based simply on one reason, but rather a multitude of reasons.
For example, whether taking advantage of a specific situation yields a
non-insignificant advantage, whether we consider the ethical implications and
the consequences of doing acting in such ways.
In my opinion, I do not think that every such instance
amounts to the same thing regardless of one’s explanation for not acting
opportunistically. I think every such instance is different, which is due to no
small part of the reason for doing so. For example, imagine a situation,
similar to that above, in which someone sees an opportunity to steal cash from
a store. If one person (let’s call this person Alex), decided not steal because
he thinks it is unethical, but another person, (let’s call this person Ben), decides
not steal cash because he is scared of the consequences, I see those situations
as different due to the reasoning for not stealing. This is because if there
were no/lenient consequences, Ben would probably still steal, whereas Alex
would not. The only reason the outcome was the same for both Ben and Alex was
because Ben did not want to get caught and therefore decided not to steal. This
is a specific and basic example, but in my opinion, this would apply to any
situation when anyone has the chance to act opportunistically but decides not
to.
Let me give you a bit of humor before responding more seriously to what you wrote. Since cheating in online environments can readily happen, instructors have learned to give an expanded definition to "collaborative learning." For those parties engaged in the activity the difference might be quite clear. For somebody on the outside, however, it looks the same.
ReplyDeleteThe general tenor of your post is that there can be two different types of reasons for refraining from opportunistic behavior. One of those I'll call character. This is internal to the person and what motivates the person to behave a certain way. The other is monitoring coupled with punishment for misdeeds. This is external to the person. We might call it deterrence.
As we will try to apply the lessons learned to considering transaction costs, it suggests the following. If prior to the transaction there might be different parties to contract with, and one does background checks and interviews with each party, then the character of the people might be an important determinant of which part is chosen. (This as opposed to whose bid comes in at the lowest price.) Now such a determination of character is far from perfect. In my case, I believe my internal radar is good at picking up signals about somebody I don't want to do business with. But if somebody gets through that screen, it is no guarantee that the person won't then act opportunistically.
Then there is the question of how the contract with the part is written, what type of monitoring is put in place and what penalties are specified for when there is failure to deliver on the contract. This too is an imperfect solution to the issue.
Your essay suggest we really should use both tools and maybe its more art than science as to what the mixture of the two should be.
Going specifically back to your story about theft of cash in a store, with surveillance cameras seemingly everywhere, unless you knew how to counter those in some way, that would seem to say the monitoring is quite strong. On a different level, when I go shopping on there is now self-checkout if you only have a small number of items. Mostly there is a person in the area who monitors, but sometimes nobody is there. It doesn't occur to me to steal in that circumstance. But more than once I've become confused about the touchscreen and scanning what I want to buy. I persist till I figure it out or till the person from the store returns and then gives assistance. But I could see frustration then leading to simply take the merchandise and leave
I think that your thought experiment at the end about Alex and Ben deciding not to steal is extremely interesting and I would love to hear some more of your thoughts on that.
ReplyDeleteI believe that if someone decides to act ethically for fear of the consequences of not doing so, they are no different than one that acts ethically because of their moral code. There is no effective difference on the outcome of the situation between the two, one just has seemingly less noble intentions.
At the end of the day I think that all a society can ask of someone is to follow its rules, not agree with them. Hopefully, in this hypothetical society, there is some some way that people could petition or vote for rules they disagree with to be changed.