Citation

Likens TW, Kohfeld CW. Polit. Methodol. 1983; 9(4): 377-406.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1983)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Traditional theories have treated mass compliance as a static phenomenon the underlying behavioral process of which is economic: men calculate, and their calculations may be influenced by positive or negative incentives. The present analysis conceptualizes compliance as a dynamic phenomenon, a process that is ordered across time. Furthermore, the analysis challenges the exclusive reliance on economic assumptions about human behavior, presenting a family of dynamic models of compliance. The first model assumes pure calculation and translates the traditional economic argument into a dynamic structure. The second model assumes pure context and demonstrates how extra-individual phenomena may be used to explain compliance over time. A final model demonstrates how both economic and social mechanisms may jointly operate on compliance behavior. The analysis demonstrates that theoretical advance may occur when compliance is treated dynamically and when theory relies on both laws of individual calculation and laws of social influence.

Language: en