Whose opinion matters?
This question is perhaps more important than any particular question of policy, law or even science that one might consider. For any issue that you consider, you can always find contrary opinions. One person says this. Another person says that. Whose opinion matters, who should be believed?
One solution is to try to separate facts from opinions. But really, this is just another way of answering the question, “whose opinion matters”: the person whose opinion is factual, instead of mere opinion.
The fact vs. opinion model works fairly well for most questions of value-free science… that is, questions concerning laws of causality. If you throw an apple up into the air, it will fall back down to the ground. This isn’t just my opinion, it’s a fact. So, the opinion of anyone who espouses this fact matters, with respect to this fact. The condtion for joining the “People Whose Opinion Matters Club” on the question of gravity is assent to the fact of gravity.
But questions of particular laws and policies are necessarily not value-free. Any value-free answer to a question of law and policy is necessarily not talking about any particular, real law or policy as it exists or would exist if really implemented. This is because people have conflicting preferences regarding actual laws and policies even if they merely have opinions about theories of law and policy.
The criteria for joining the “Whose Opinion Matters Club” in questions of law and policy should be the same as it is for gravity - assent to the value-free facts of the matter. For example, Austrian Business Cycle Theory gives a factual, value-free description of the consequences of low-interest rate policies. Whether you prefer that interest rates be low or high or that business-cycles do or do not occur is beside the point to the value-free causal theory of what happens when interests are low or high, etc.
But your preferences regarding the actual existence of the central bank and its actual decisions - for example, in setting low interest rates - are not irrelevant because the question of actual decisions is never value-free. The question “whose opinion matters” rears its ugly head again.
I think there are general heuristics that people tend to follow in answering this question. For example, people assume that the opinion of someone who has studied a subject longer should matter more than the opinion of someone who has studied a subject less. For example, the opinion of the economist regarding corporate tax should supersede the opinion of the actual owner of a corporation, who has not studied such a tax. Now this heuristic is not completely wrong but in this case it clearly leads to a serious problem: the actual owner of a corporation has a real interest in the corporation which is based on the fact that his property claims are all legitimate. Raising the opinion of the tax academic above the opinion of the owner of the property in question is simply backwards. We’ve picked the wrong opinion to listen to.
This situation occurs everywhere in society. The opinion of the child psychologist supersedes the opinion of not only both parents but also grandparents and all other interested kin. The basis of this precedence is the technical credentials of the “expert” which - in many cases - is a perfectly wonderful basis for choosing this over that opinion.
So what is the cause of the problem? Why do we frequently end up choosing the wrong opinion to listen to, that is, misidentifying whose opinion matters? I believe that a major contributor to this persistent mistake is the failure to look at more than just technical credentials. Who benefits? Who is hurt? Whose property was it to begin with?
Let’s say I spent my life studying the money supply and then concluded that only a genius who has spent his life studying the money supply and with exactly and only my opinions and credentials is qualified to manage the money supply. Would that be a proper basis for everyone to turn over management of the money supply to me? There’s an obvious conflict-of-interest in such an opinion: I benefit from it! Of course I would say that all money production should be managed by me! My technical credentials are irrelevant to the question of whether my opinion should matter on the question of whether I should be permitted to manage the money supply because there is a manifest conflict-of-interest in my opinion on such a question.
Democracy is a metaphor for a larger shift in thinking… everyone has a vote. Everyone has a say. But the fact of the matter is that it is just as important whose opinion is excluded as it is whose opinion is counted. The geocentrist’s opinion is rightly excluded from the science of astronomy. The Keynesian’s opinion is rightly excluded from the science of economics. But these are questions of value-free science.
When it comes to questions of value, questions where people’s chosen preferences are in conflict or where actual property is at stake, the opinions of those who do not stand to benefit or lose from the matter and those whose property is not at stake should be excluded from consideration. This is because there is a conflict-of-interest inherent in expressing an opinion on a matter which does not (yet) affect you - namely, you may be able to turn the outcome of the dispute in such a way that it does benefit you.
Let’s say Alice steals Bob’s television. That is between Alice and Bob. But now let’s say Charlie steps in to “settle” the matter by seizing the television from Alice, liquidating it, and giving half of the proceeds to Bob, keeping the rest as his “fee”. Charlie has enriched himself by interjecting himself into a dispute that did not concern him. Charlie’s opinion on the Alice-versus-Bob dispute is irrelevant because there is an inherent conflict-of-interest in Charlie’s expression of his opinion. Of course Charlie thinks he should settle Alice and Bob’s dispute because he stands to benefit in the process.
There is a principle in historical scholarship called adversarial testimony or adversial witness (also used in law), which basically says that if someone says something bad about their enemy or something good about themselves, it’s probably exaggerated or simply false. But if someone says something good about their enemy or something bad about themselves, then that’s more likely to be true - maybe even an understatement. I only mention the principle to bring out the crucial importance of real interests and social relationships in determining the relevance of expressed opinions. Technical credentials and expert consensus are irrelevant if there is a conflict-of-interest.
We need to spend some more time thinking about whose opinion matters and why. Not everyone’s opinion matters to everything (democratic science). The opinions of those who stand to benefit from the very opinion in question should also be excluded from consideration (cui bono). The opinions of those who have nothing to lose either way on the outcome of a question of law or policy should be excluded from consideration. In part, modern democracy has flooded the public policy debate with opinions that should be excluded not because they are stupid or uninformed but because they are either motivated by self-interest or they have nothing to lose and are, therefore, unaccountable to the outcome.
Clayton -