Peter Stillman asks, "Isn't there something ideological in seeing   
economics as a theory of choice?"  The rest of his argument, suggesting   
a positive answer to the question shows how misleading that way of   
thinking can be.  
  
Life, wherever is it lived, is a series of choices people make.  To say   
that we make choices "under constraints" is simply an elaboration.  So   
is the proposition that economics studies choices "under scarcity."  
  
Where there is no scarcity of one thing or another, there is no need for   
choosing.  Is it because an individual has a limited capacity for food   
[stomach] that s/he has to make a choice among the available quantity   
and variety of foods the individual has or can purchase to eat at a   
point in time, however rich or poor they may be.  It is because the   
number of hours in a day is limited to 24 that an individual has to   
choose between activities -- allocate these hours between alternative   
uses.  (I'd be most grateful if someone can find a situation of choice   
where there is no limitation, constraint, or scarcity of one thing or   
another.)  
  
Perhaps studying the nature of the constraints under which people make   
their purposive (or rational) choices may be a useful endeavor.  But let   
no one kid him- or herself into thinking that the burden of studying the   
acts of choosing, which is the purview of economics as a science, then   
changes.  This is why many authors of elementary economics textbooks try   
to make the point that economics is relevant to all human societies, be   
they capitalist, socialist, or whatever.  The predominant ideology under   
which different societies are organized is irrelevant to the fact that   
people always make choices under limitations or constraints.  Only the   
things chosen or the forms in which those choices are made may differ.  
  
James Ahiakpor