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Opportunism

Opportunism 'Opportunism' is the conscious policy and practice of taking selfish advantage of circumstances – with little regard for principles, or with what the consequences are for others. Opportunist actions are expedient actions guided primarily by self-interested motives. The term can be applied to individual humans and living organisms, groups, organizations, styles, behaviours, and trends.

Opportunism Opportunism or opportunistic behavior is an important concept in such fields of study as biology, transaction cost economics, game theory, ethics, psychology, sociology and politics.

Opportunism - Definition
Luskin, Newt's Bain Opportunism Is Mitt's Opportunity

Somewhat confusingly, opportunism is sometimes also redefined by businessmen simply as the theory of discovering and pursuing opportunities.Shraga F. Biran, Opportunism: How to Change the World--One Idea at a Time. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, These businessmen are motivated by their dislike for the idea that there could ever be anything wrong with capitalizing on opportunities. According to this redefinition, opportunism is a euphemism for entrepreneurship.

Taking a Realism (international relations)|realistic or practical approach to a problem can involve weak forms of opportunism. For the sake of doing something that will work, or that successfully solves the problem, a previously agreed principle is knowingly compromised or disregarded - with the justification that alternative actions would, overall, have a worse effect.

In choosing or seizing opportunities, human opportunism is most likely to occur where:

Criticism of opportunism usually refers to a situation where beliefs and principles are tested or challenged.

Human opportunism should not be confused with seeking opportunities as such, or making use of opportunities when they arise. Opportunism refers rather to a specific way of responding to opportunities, which involves the element of self-interestedness plus disregard for relevant (ethical) principles, or for intended or previously agreed goals, or for the shared concerns of a group.Luke Johnson (businessman)|Luke Johnson, A new lexicon to celebrate capitalism, Financial Times, October 25, 2011.

Opportunism - Etymology
However, it is more likely that the English expression was directly borrowed from the French term, when it began to refer specifically to the opportunist Republicans, since the term first entered the English language in the early 1870s.According to the Grand Larousse encyclopédique, opportunism was the name given to the cautious reformism and nationalism of French Republicanism|Republicans, who advocated moderate policies to consolidate the French Third Republic after the eviction of the Monarchism|monarchists

Opportunism - Moral connotations
Thus, opportunism involves compromising some or other principle normally upheld

Thus, substantively, opportunism refers to someone who acts on opportunities in a self-interested, biased or one-sided manner that conflicts or contrasts in some way with a (more general) rule, law, norm, or principle

Moralists may have a distaste for opportunism, insofar as opportunism implies the violation of a moral principle.

Opportunism - Human behaviour
Opportunism is regarded as unhealthy, as a disorder or as a character deficiency, if selfishly pursuing an opportunity is blatantly anti-social behaviour|anti-social (involves disregard for the needs, wishes and interests of others)

The sociology and psychology of human opportunism is somewhat related to the study of gambling behaviour, and centres on the way people respond to risk and opportunity, and what kind of motivation and organizational culture is involved. Both the element of risk and opportunity play a role. To be opportunist in behaviour, a person or group must:

Whatever the opportunist's exact motive, it always involves the element of selfishness. Psychologically, it follows that opportunism always assumes a basic ability to make one's own choices, and decide to act in a way that serves one's own interest. In turn, that presupposes at least some basic self-motivation, inner direction, inventiveness and behavioural freedom; subjectively, an opportunist must at least be able to recognize and respond to opportunities when they are there.

Opportunism - Eight main contexts
In other words, the absence of relevant controls on behaviour is likely to facilitate opportunism.Joris Lammers Diederik Stapel|Diederik A

*'Advantages': the prevalence of opportunist behaviour is likely to be influenced by the perception that the pay-off or advantage of engaging in it, outweighs possible disadvantages or penalties. Opportunism is facilitated if the situation permits an actor to appropriate the gains or advantages to be had from an activity to themselves, while shifting the costs, blame and disadvantages to others. This may be regarded as unfair competition.

Opportunist behaviour can be self-reinforcing: if there is a lot of opportunism, then not to be opportunist oneself would mean that competitors take advantage of that, and therefore people can be forced into an opportunist role as a defensive strategy.

If the situation is one where shared rules are lacking, where it is quite uncertain what the relevant rule to apply is, or where everything is very uncertain or chaotic, plenty of scope exists for opportunist behaviour.Government's sudden need to debate terror bill smacks of opportunism, The Globe and Mail, 22 April 2013.[

*'Awareness': if people are for some or other reason deceiving themselves about the real consequences of their actions, they are more likely to initiate or condone opportunist behaviour; if they were more aware, that wouldn't happen to the same extent. Opportunism is facilitated if for any reason there is a low level of awareness that it is happening. Perceptions of the strengths and vulnerabilities of others and oneself may play an important role.

*'Success': opportunism often involves the presence of a very strong desire (emotion)|desire to be popular, to exercise influence or to succeed in making gains. That motivation can promote the urge to win something by any means necessary, even if it means to cut corners and do things not consistent with relevant principles. If people are for some reason motivated to do anything at all to achieve success, they are more likely to engage in opportunist behaviour for that very reason.

Opportunism - Five main organizational influences
*'Controls': some organizations may have a code of behaviour or set of rules that makes opportunist behaviour difficult, because organizational policy sets clear and immediate penalties for such behaviour. Other organizations may be so loosely structured and so lacking in controls and sanctions regulating behaviour, that opportunism becomes almost unavoidable.

Opportunism - Five main organizational influences
*'Purpose': the scope for opportunism depends very much on the nature and goals of the organization itself, and on the strength and integrity of its leadership

Opportunism - Professional opportunism
In professional ethics, the concept of opportunism plays a role in defining criteria for professional integrity.Chester Barnard has a chapter on the theory of opportunism in his classic work The Functions of the Executive (Harvard University Press, originally published in 1938)

Opportunism - Intellectual opportunism
The phenomenon of intellectual opportunism is frequently associated by its critics with careerism

Opportunism - Sexual opportunism
Sexual opportunism is sometimes also defined as the use of sexual favours for selfish purposes quite unrelated to the sexual activity, in which case taking a sexual opportunity is merely the means to achieve a quite different purpose, for example to advance one's career or obtain social status|status or money.Graham Scambler, Sex Work Stigma: Opportunist Migrants in London

Opportunism - Sexual opportunism
In a clinical or scientific sense, sexual opportunism is often straightforwardly described as observable sexual promiscuity or the observable propensity to engage in casual sex, whatever the motive.

Opportunism - Evolutionary opportunism
In the theory of evolution, evolutionary opportunism refers to a specific pattern of development in the history of a species

Opportunism - Biological opportunism
In microbiology, opportunism refers to the ability of a normally non-pathogenic microorganism to act as a pathogen in certain circumstances

Opportunism - Political opportunism
The term opportunism is often used in politics and political science, and by activists campaigning for a cause. The political philosophy of Niccolò Machiavelli as described in The Prince is often regarded as a classic manual of opportunist scheming. Political opportunism is interpreted in different ways, but usually refers to one or more of the following:

Opportunism - Political opportunism
There are four main sources of political opportunism: suivisme (a specific political methodology that is applied to maintain or increase political influence), populism, risk management, and means become ends.

Opportunism - Economic opportunism
Saparito, Individualism, Collectivism, and Opportunism: A Cultural Perspective on Transaction Cost Economics

2 February 2005.[

Glenn R. ParkerIn his book Self-policing in politics: the political economy of reputational controls on politicians (Princeton University Press, 2004, p.21). claims that the five most discussed examples of economic opportunism are:

*reneging (in contracts), where a contractual agreement, promise, intention or understanding of a deal is not fully honoured by a party to the contract, for selfish motives, because it is possible to get away with it and/or because there is an incentive to do so.See e.g. G. Richard Shell, Opportunism and trust in the Negotiation of Commercial Contracts: Toward a New Cause of Action. Vanderbilt Law Review, Vol. 44, March 1991, pp

Turtle, Legal Opportunism, Litigation Risk, and IPO Underpricing, January 2009 [ Paul J

Opportunism - Game theory
In this game-theoretical sense, Paul Seabright defines opportunism as the behaviour of those who seek to benefit from the efforts of others without contributing anything themselves.Paul Seabright, The company of strangers: a natural history of economic life

Opportunism - Game theory
In game theory, therefore, opportunism is not defined as being intrinsically and necessarily always a good thing or a bad thing; it could be either

Opportunism - Social opportunism
Social opportunism refers to the use of opportunities for social contact only for selfish purposes or motives

Opportunism - Social opportunism
Other social groupings may try to prevent social opportunism, by imposing strict preconditions of participation to ward off opportunists, or with the aid of rules prohibiting opportunist behaviour.

Opportunism - Marxist theory of opportunism
Its main claim is that opportunism is not simply an aberration or impediment to the efficient functioning of capitalism, but an integral and necessary characteristic of it; capitalist market activity promotes opportunist moves in all sorts of ways

Opportunism - Marxist theory of opportunism
Elif Çağlı, A Dangerous Tendency: Opportunism] Critics of the Marxian interpretation argue that the problem of undesirable forms of opportunism appears in any large population subject to a complex division of labour, or any industrialized society (including a socialist one), since – whatever the rhetorics – it is in practice unable to maintain a shared social ethic, and because it creates plenty scope for competitors to take advantage of each other in an unprincipled way.

Opportunism - Legal opportunism
The general effect of legal opportunism, if it really occurs, is that it discredits the rule of law or destroys the legitimacy of particular legal rules in the eyes of the people affected by them

Opportunism - Legal opportunism
Legal opportunism can involve practices such as the following:

Opportunism - Spiritual opportunism
Spirituality|Spiritual opportunism refers to the exploitation of spiritual ideas (or of the spirituality of others, or of spiritual authority): for personal gain, partisan interests or selfish motives. Usually the implication is that doing so is unprincipled in some way, although it may cause no harm and involve no abuse. In other words, religion becomes a means to achieve something that is alien to it, or things are projected into religion that do not belong there.

The term spiritual opportunism is also used in the sense of casting around for suitable spiritual beliefs borrowed and cobbled together in some way to justify, condemn or make sense of particular ways of behaving, usually with some partisan or ulterior motive. This may not be abusive, but it often gives rise to criticisms or accusationsAn example is Robert M. Price, Top Secret: The Truth Behind Today’s Pop Mysticisms. Prometheus Books, 2008 that the given spiritual beliefs:

Supporters of traditional religions such as Christianity, Islam, Hinduism or Buddhism sometimes complain that people (such as New Age enthusiasts) seek out spiritual beliefs that serve only themselves, as a form of spiritual opportunism

Spiritual opportunism sometimes refers also to the practice of proselytizing one's spiritual beliefs when any opportunity to do so arises, for the purpose of winning over, or persuading others, about the superiority of these beliefs

Fascism - Unprincipled opportunism
Some critics of Italian fascism have argued that much of the ideology was merely a by-product of unprincipled opportunism by Mussolini, and that he changed his political stances merely to bolster his personal ambitions while he disguised them as being purposeful to the public.Gerhard Schreiber, Bernd Stegemann, Detlef Vogel

International Communist Party - On opportunism
In opposition to opportunism, it rejects the subordination of the party's action to that of political committees of fronts, coalitions or alliances even if this subordination was to restrict itself to public declarations and be compensated by internal instructions to militants or the party and by the subjective intentions of the leaders

Fascists - Unprincipled opportunism
Some critics of Italian fascism have said that much of the ideology was merely a by-product of unprincipled opportunism by Mussolini, and that he changed his political stances merely to bolster his personal ambitions while he disguised them as being purposeful to the public.Gerhard Schreiber, Bernd Stegemann, Detlef Vogel

Intellectual opportunism
'Intellectual opportunism' is the pursuit of intellectual opportunities with a selfish, ulterior motive not consistent with relevant principles. The term refers to certain self-serving tendencies of the human intellect, often involving professional producers and disseminators of ideas, who work with idea-formation all the time.

Intellectual opportunism
Thus, a certain set of people who share ideas are then said to display a tendency for intellectual opportunism, often with the connotation that they deliberately act intellectually in a certain way, to gain special favor with an authority, group or organization; to justify a state of affairs that benefits themselves; or because they have the motive of financial or personal gain.

Intellectual opportunism - Background
Theoretical opportunism in science refers to the attempt to save a theory from refutation, or protect it from criticism, with the use of ad hoc methods that in some way lack deeper scientific consistency or credibility

Intellectual opportunism - Background
The phenomenon of intellectual opportunism is frequently associated by its critics with careerism and dubious, unprincipled self-promotion, where ideas become just another commodity or a bargaining tool. When human knowledge becomes a tradeable good in a market of ideas, all sorts of opportunities arise for huckstering, swindling, haggling and hustling with information in ways which are regarded as unprincipled, dubious or involve deceit of some sort.

Intellectual opportunism - Morality
* Compromises what he really believes in, for the sake of some ulterior motive or purpose.Jim Quilty, Political realities and intellectual opportunism. The Daily Star (Beirut), 19 May 2006.[

Intellectual opportunism - Morality
Often intellectual opportunism is therefore understood as a sign of lack of integrity or intellectual shallowness, to the extent that the opportunist is not concerned with the worth of the ideas in themselves, but only with how he can benefit from them himself by pursuing them. As a corollary, the intellectual opportunist is often apt to change his opinions, and change his line rapidly or arbitrarily, according to where he can gain personal advantage, in a manner not consistent or principled.

Intellectual opportunism - Perception
Intellectual opportunism may appear obvious or crass, if the selfish motives for engaging in it are clear. It may also be very difficult to detect if:

*the intellectual opportunist is himself not aware of his own opportunism, i.e

*the relevant and appropriate moral norms are themselves in dispute, so that the validity of the assessment of opportunism in intellectual behaviour depends on point of view.

There may however be just as much opportunism in Europe as anywhere else, but with a different cultural style

Economic opportunism 'Economic opportunism' is a term related to the subversion of morality to profit (economics)|profit.

Economic opportunism Saparito, Individualism, Collectivism, and Opportunism: A Cultural Perspective on Transaction Cost Economics

Economic opportunism *It is not feasible to outlaw many forms of economic opportunism, because any such law could not be effectively enforced, or, such laws would conflict with the civil rights or trading rights of citizens

Economic opportunism Hill, Cooperation, Opportunism and the Invisible Hand: Implications for transaction cost theory, in: Academy of Management Review, Vol

Economic opportunism Opportunism could then be thought of as an aberration, a market imperfection or a grey area that sometimes occurs in normal trading activity.

Economic opportunism 15, Issue 3, 2004.[ The entitlement to make some economic gains is then considered to be illegitimate, in some way.

Economic opportunism 2 February 2005.[ Even so, people might just try to get the most out of a situation for themselves with the least effort they can get away with, disregarding the interests of others who also have a stake in the situation (see Stakeholder (corporate)|stakeholder)

Economic opportunism Therefore there is always much controversy about what these obligations really are, in the fine detail – it may be that one man's opportunism is another man's opportunity.

Economic opportunism For this reason, institutional economics often evaluates economic opportunism in relation to those norms of acceptable human conduct that, though not necessarily stated in laws, are nevertheless implied by legislation or by jurisprudence

Economic opportunism Turtle, Legal Opportunism, Litigation Risk, and IPO Underpricing, January [ Paul J

Legal opportunism 'Legal opportunism' is a wide area of human activity, which refers generally to a type of abuse of the proper intention of legal arrangements (the spirit of the law as distinguished from the letter of the law). More specifically, it refers to deliberately manipulating legal arrangements for purposes they were not meant for, guided by self-interested motives.

Legal opportunism Often, legal opportunism is enabled because a rule must be interpreted in order to apply it (i.e., how exactly it applies in the given situation is not self-evident or obvious), where the chosen interpretation is precisely the one that favours one's self-interest

Legal opportunism It should be noted, that in an adversarial system all kinds of tactics can be legitimately used by lawyers in a self-interested way to help them win their case, without being illegal. Therefore, to prove legal opportunism as a specific form of abuse of the legal process, for some selfish purpose, can be quite a challenge.

Spiritual opportunism
'Spirituality|Spiritual opportunism' refers to the exploitation of spiritual ideas (or of the spirituality of others, or of spiritual authority): for personal gain, partisan interests or selfish motives. Usually the implication is that doing so is unprincipled in some way, although it may cause no harm and involve no abuse. In other words, religion becomes a means to achieve something that is alien to it, or things are projected into religion that do not belong there.

Spiritual opportunism
If accusations of spiritual opportunism are made, therefore, evidential proof depends greatly on what people are willing to reveal (or confess) about themselves in what they say and do.

Political opportunism
'Political opportunism' refers to the attempt to maintain political support, or increase political influence, in a way which disregards relevant ethical or political Value (personal and cultural)|principles.

Political opportunism - Definition
The interviewer, Michael Laurence, asked Aren’t you saying that there’s been a large element of political opportunism in Nixon’s reversals? and Friedman replied: One man’s opportunism is another’s statesmanship

Political opportunism - Definition
*Often the opportunist operates in a situation where there exist many wikt:unknowns|unknowns, and where there is no broad agreement on how one should respond to the situation in a principled way.Jürgen Habermas accused Angela Merkel of opportunism in the following terms: Since the Greek crisis erupted in May 2010 and Merkel's Christian Democrats lost the state election in North Rhine-Westphalia, she has subordinated each of her considered steps to the opportunism of staying in power

Political opportunism - The role of principles
Chris Arsenault, Nicaragua's Ortega: Socialism to opportunism?

Political opportunism - The role of principles
This becomes critically important in understanding opportunism insofar as it is a departure from principled behaviour.

Political opportunism - Assessment
Namely, if their purpose is based only or primarily on self-interest—disregarding higher principles, which is the hallmark of opportunism—then politics is the least likely vocation, since it requires that politicians serve a collective interest or cause bigger than themselves

Few actions are intrinsically opportunist; they are opportunist in a specific context, or from a specific point of view about means-ends relationships involved. This may make an objective approach to assessing the presence of opportunism quite difficult, because it may require a lot of inside knowledge about the relevant circumstances and about the motives involved.

Yet insofar as allegations of opportunism reflect a moral judgment, they may also contain a subjective interpretation, emotional preference or partisan (political)|partisan viewpoint.David Brooks, The upside of opportunism

Political opportunism - Sources
*'Suivisme': Some political analysts find the source of opportunism in a specific political methodology that is applied to maintain or increase political influence

*'Risk management': some analysts see opportunism as originating in perceptions of the relative magnitudes of risk associated with different policy alternatives

*'Means become ends': a more general source of political opportunism is simply the great urge to achieve political success, to be successful, where success is defined as attaining a position of power, authority and influence (which in turn makes it possible to enact one's own policy)

Political opportunism - Dilemmas
To some extent, politics unavoidably involves dilemmas about whether to insist on one's own principles (and risk being isolated) or to adapt to a more widely held opinion for the sake of working together. People may be very unwilling to take risks and respond to opportunities, or they may take risks and opportunities without much regard for their overall significance. Accordingly, most political situations involve at least some potential for opportunism.

At best, one could be aware of the possibility that opportunism could become a real problem, and take steps to minimize the risk

Sectarianism and opportunism might however also combine, to the extent that a sect believes that almost any trick is permissible to attract more members to the sect.

That is why it is especially important to evaluate criticisms of opportunism in context.

Political opportunism - Drawbacks
Continual political opportunism ultimately reduces the scope of politics to a visionless realpolitik or a barren pragmatism that may only function to maintain the status quo, and in which people deceive themselves about their own motivations and those of others. This makes life even more difficult for politicians, in their attempt to persuade people to work together for common goals. According to journalist Adam Nagourney, Many Americans are more likely to assume that anyone they read or see on

Sexual opportunism 'Sexual opportunism' is the pursuit of sexual opportunities to take advantage of certain situations.

Sexual opportunism the practice of adapting your actions, responses, etc, to take advantage of opportunities, circumstances, etc ⇒ The Energy Minister said that the opposition's concern for the environment was political opportunism.

Sexual opportunism Sexual opportunism can sometimes be defined as the use of sexual favours for selfish purposes quite unrelated to the sexual activity, in which case taking a sexual opportunity is merely the means to achieve a quite different purpose

Sexual opportunism has always been a much disputed concept, because:

Sexual opportunism Thus the exact boundary between seizing a sexual opportunity and sexual opportunism may in practice be difficult to distinguish

Khorloogiin Choibalsan - Right Opportunism 1925-1928
Following Danzan’s death, Choibalsan and Rinchino's political influence diminish as the party’s right wing, led by Tseren-Ochiryn Dambadorj, assumed control and, during a period later referred to as the “Right Opportunism” ( ), promoted rightist policies mirroring Lenin’s New Economic Policy in the Soviet Union.

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