The Definition of Nudge and Libertarian Paternalism: Does the Hand Fit the Glove?
By P. G. Hansen. European Journal of Risk Regulation, 2016
247 citations recorded by the source corpus.
In recent years the concepts of ‘nudge’ and ‘libertarian paternalism’ have become popular theoretical as well as practical concepts inside as well as outside academia. But in spite of the widespread interest, confusion reigns as to what exactly is to be regarded as a nudge and how the underlying approach to behaviour change relates to libertarian paternalism. This article sets out to improve the clarity and value of the definition of nudge by reconciling it with its theoretical foundations in behavioural economics. In doing so it not only explicates the relationship between nudges and libertarian paternalism, but also clarifies how nudges relate to incentives and information, and may even be consistent with the removal of certain types of choices. In the end we are left with a revised definition of the concept of nudge that allows for consistently categorising behaviour change interventions as such and that places them relative to libertarian paternalism.
Subfields: Cognitive Neuroscience, Economics and Econometrics
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/f42054e21af74840574b835f928864c413f7b6a6
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Citations in the corpus
- Green nudges: Do they work? Are they ethical? (2016, background): “While the exact definition of nudges is a matter of some controversy (Hansen, 2016; Rebonato, 2012), we can sidestep the philosophical issues and adopt the definition that can be found in Thaler and Sunstein's own contributions (Thaler and Sunstein, 2008, Sunstein, 2014a, 2014b): nudges are…”
- A Review of Nudges: Definitions, Justifications, Effectiveness (2020, unknown): “Arguably, the most articulated discussion of the notion of a nudge is that provided by Hansen (2016).”