Rationality, Freedom and Reason

Rationality, Freedom and Reason Rationality and Freedom by Amartya Sen; Oxford University Press, New Delhi, first published in India in 2003;
ACHIN CHAKRABORTY Rational choice theory, which flourished in economics over the greater part of the last century and subsequently invaded other social science disciplines, rests almost exclusively on an instrumental interpretation of rationality. In this interpretation, the individual is identified with a set of objectives; and an action is treated as rational if it best satisfies those objectives. More specifically, in economics, it is assumed that individuals have preferences, and instrumentally rationalaction is defined in terms of a certain structure onthe relations of preferences over alternatives.