THE `COGNITIVIST MODEL'

Abstract

Recently, two French doctors were convicted in a trial dealing with the transfusion of blood contaminated by the AIDS virus. A petition was signed all over the world by numerous doctors and scientists, including 30 Nobel Prize winners, making the point that the trial had been unfair and requiring that the French President use his prerogative of presidential pardon, which can effectively be applied in this case, to release the doctors from jail. A strong majority disapproved of the proposal. Influential members of the government had already made clear they would not recommend a pardon. This is an example of current `collective beliefs', which the social sciences should be able to explain. The example is taken because the `collective belief' appears here as unusually strong. Can the `rational-choice model' explain this social fact satisfactorily? Can the classical sociological `internalization of norms' model explain it? It is contended that none of them can explain the case as it is. If so, there are many important facts which cannot easily be explained by these two current models. From this example, a model is sketched, the `cognitive model', of which the rational-choice model turns out to be a particular case.