A Value-based Argument Model of Convention Degradation

Abstract

The analysis of how social conventions emerge and become established is rightly viewed as a significant study of great relevance to models of legal and social systems. Such conventions, however, do not operate in a monotonic fashion, i.e. the fact that a convention is recognised and complied with at some instant is no guarantee it will continue to be so indefinitely. In total rules and protocols may evolve, with or without the consent of individual members of the society, even to the extent that some cease to be observed or effective. In this paper we examine a framework for examining such changes in behavioural conventions that uses a proposed “taxonomy of social conventions” as the basis of a qualitative model deriving from value-based argument systems.

Appendix: An example of irrefragable convention in codified systems

The system we have in mind is the canon of assertions prescribed as fundamental beliefs within the Roman Catholic faith. This canon has evolved over a period of roughly two thousand years and we wish to focus on the following aspects in justifying our presentation of it as a system containing “irrefragable conventions”.

• a. It is codified: fundamental beliefs are articulated and presented in, for example, documents such as the 1994 Catechism.

• b. The addition of “new” articles takes effect only in very precisely defined circumstances.

• c. An acceptance of all such articles is a necessary condition to be regarded as a member of the society, i.e. recognised as a practising member of the church.

• d. The canon of required beliefs increases monotonically, i.e. once an article has been established according to the provisions specified in (b) it cannot be revoked.

The formal process supporting (b) and its scope are summarised under paragraphs 890–892 of the 1994 Catechism, and although the doctrine delineating it, i.e. the principle of papal infallibility, is comparatively recent – being presented in the 1870 constitution Pastor aeternus of Pius IX – this statement did not accrue new powers to the central authority (i.e. the Papacy) but was rather a clarification of the implications of existing teaching regarding the exact circumstances and domains in which infallible pronouncements held force: thus, the 1870 doctrine could be seen as an explicit limitation of papal authority rather than an extension of it, e.g. the encyclicals Divini redemptoris (1937, attacking Communism); or Laborem exercens (1981, affirming workers’ rights) are not accorded the status of infallible teachings. In fact, the only occasion, following the 1870 clarification, on which ex cathedra, an article of faith has been added, was the 1950 proclamation of the doctrine of the Assumption. Thus, prior to its declaration one was free (as a practising Roman Catholic) to accept or to deny this belief; post its formal statement – noting the stipulation (c) – one could not consistently claim both that one was a practising member of the church and to deny (or, indeed, even to be neutral regarding) acceptance of this doctrine.

In principle, although compared to its exercise barely a century ago such action is nowadays extremely rare, open statements of doubt concerning the canon of required beliefs is subject to the penalty of exclusion from the society, i.e. the sanction of excommunication. We would argue in addition, however, that even unexpressed doubt or denial is inconsistent with the concept of being within the society: the conditions governing acceptance admitting no region of “choice” in such matters.

Of course, the central point at issue here, the reason why, for example “acceptance of the doctrine of the Assumption” is an irrefragable convention in exactly the sense we wish to use, concerns the assertion (d) above.

The exercise of authority represented by an infallible decree carries a number of significant consequences affecting not only the attitudes that it enforces on members of the society, i.e. the implications of (c), but also on any future actions, i.e. since any doctrine so defined must be accepted as an infallibly “revealed truth”, there cannot (within the principles promoted) be any future pronouncement casting doubt on it. It should be noted that the “act of revelation” is not subject to question by the standards that might be applied in other settings, e.g. as discussed in Bench-Capon (1980).

In these terms one can identify only the following positions to be taken with respect to an hypothetical reversal of a doctrine once deemed to be “infallibly true”.

• 1. Such action is held to be impossible: effectively the standpoint of those accepting the fundamental precepts within the society, i.e. practising members of the church.

• 2. There is no authority empowered to exercise such action, and so, in a similar way to (1), a (putative) “infallible” revocation of fundamental belief cannot be issued under the authority of “infallibility”.

• 3. Such actions would be “schismatic”, thereby fundamentally altering the nature of the underlying social system, dividing it between those who rejected the revocation – via (1) and (2) – and those accepting it – via (c).

These effects provide the principal motivation for arguing that this system provides one example of “irrefragable conventions” within an evolving codified system other than that deriving from game-playing conventions.