Institutional Design

So I took Secured Transactions this quarter. I highly recommend it, it's very logical. It also makes you think a lot about institutional design. As usual with me, once I got that concept in my head I saw it everywhere. I've been thinking about how certain social institutions work, whether there are flaws and whether we get what we want out of them. Let's start with dating.

Of course, the structure of dating isn't determined by a code like the UCC. It has evolved without a conscious designer (though aspects have been engineered). Still, it purports to fulfill human goals in a system flawed by human shortcomings. Close enough for me.

So the thing about dating is that you need two willing participants. I suspect, though, that there is no real shortage of potential compatible couples. The problem isn't scarcity of willing people, it's an information problem. People need to identify the other people who are interested in them.

In particular, at least in my experience, communicating interest to someone is very difficult. Essentially, you have to use a formal system of signalling that everyone understands. This means that you have to use the word "date" if you want to make sure that you both have the same expectations about spending time together. It reminds me of the formal requirements for a contract back in the day: a seal and melted wax. It was arbitrary and cumbersome, but the point was that there was no mistaking it for anything else. Similarly, the word "date," while awkward, indicates something that is unmistakable: romantic interest.

One consequences is that, however much you try to spread out the process of getting involved with someone, it still comes down to that moment when you pull out the seal and wax (figuratively, for most people; for me literally). So you can ask someone to have coffee, but everyone knows that's the same as asking for a date. The process always collapses to whatever unmistakable signal you choose to send. People try to get around this with probabilistic signals, ambiguous statements or actions that hint at attraction. I don't think this works at all, but I could be wrong. I'll come back to that issue in another post.

The problems with this system are pretty serious. First, the signals are arbitrary and thus not obvious to people unfamiliar with the culture. More importantly, though, the collapse of the signal-sending down to one moment makes it very difficult to time it right. You can't let the moment come too early, or the person you're interested in won't know enough about you to give a good answer. If it comes too late, though, you can miss the opportunity, become "just friends," or the person will think you're not interested. If the process were truly gradual, timing would be less crucial.

Of course, dating isn't a necessity. In fact, increasingly people seem to have no interest in dating. They can get their sex and their companionship elsewhere, so what's the point? This is fine, except that a good system of dating, like a good system of secured transactions, facilitates mutually beneficial interactions. Some people can't get sex outside of dating. Others would just like a stable relationship. As our flawed system limps along, a lot of these people are simply frustrated and lonely.