Page 208 - Critical Political Economy of the Media

Media convergence, communications regulation 187

of accumulation. Such problems are compounded when the analysis shifts to
global capitalisms, and the varieties of state–capitalist formations.

Public choice theory
Public choice is a form of ‘positive’ political economy as it both celebrates and
founds its theory of human action on principles of possessive individualism,
rational self-interest and acquisitiveness. Analytically, public choice analysis
focuses on explanations for rational decision-making. According to this public
choice (or rational choice) theory ‘preferences and bargaining of actors explain
decisions and outcomes’ (John 2003: 15). Drawing its methods and inspiration
from neoclassical economics, rational choice tests hypotheses about human
behaviour based on the premise that individuals make choices based on self-
serving preferences. In doing so it ‘replaces the institutional language of political
structure and power with the economic language of markets, utilities, and
preferences’ (Mosco 1996: 264). For advocates such as John (2003: 18), rational
choice theory provides the basis for an integrated explanatory account, linking
individual action to the changing structures individuals face – which include the
constraints of institutions, influence of group membership, socio-economic
structures and preferences of other individuals. However, proponents offer a
reductive account of motivation as anchored in rational self-interest (although
altruistic behaviour can be modelled too). People seek to maximise their personal
utility rather than serve collective goods. Accordingly, ‘policy entrepreneurs’ act
to advance their careers if their policy ideas are successful. Rational choice is
also unable to explain adequately the basis on which preferences are formed,
why decision makers select a particular course of action, or why a policy may be
desirable over and above the interests of the actors involved. Public choice,
though, has had a significant influence on policy-making activity, influencing
analysis of how markets can operate more effectively and how regulation and
other ‘opportunity costs’ influence market actors’ decision-making.

Institutional and other approaches
Institutional approaches examine the ways in which political organisations, such
as parliaments and legal systems, structure policy decisions. So-called new insti-
tutionalism developed from the 1980s with renewed academic interest in the role
of institutions, the state in particular, in politics. This approach sees institutions
as sites in which norm and conventions of behaviour are reproduced, but
addresses critiques of institutional approaches being overly static and structuralist
by seeking to assess the role of institutions alongside other influences on political
action.
New institutionalists have adopted and broadened the economic concept of
path dependency, to examine how the institutional and other arrangements
established by policy action can constrain, without entirely determining,