Home > Research > Publications & Outputs > Three Challenges for Behavioural Science and Po...

Research

Electronic data

  • Final_Behavioural_Science_and_Policy_Commentary_17_Jan

    Rights statement: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/behavioural-public-policy/article/three-challenges-for-behavioural-science-and-policy-the-empirical-the-normative-and-the-political/6934E3ED1A1FE1E5714A9309BB73D1A6 The final, definitive version of this article has been published in the Journal, Behavioural Public Policy, 2 (2), pp 174-182 2018, © 2018 Cambridge University Press.

    Accepted author manuscript, 306 KB, PDF document

    Available under license: CC BY-NC: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Links

Text available via DOI:

View graph of relations

Three Challenges for Behavioural Science and Policy: The Empirical, the Normative, and the Political

Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Comment/debate › peer-review

Published
Close
More...
<mark>Journal publication date</mark>11/2018
<mark>Journal</mark>Behavioural Public Policy
Issue number2
Volume2
Number of pages9
Pages (from-to)174-182
Publication StatusPublished
Early online date14/08/18
<mark>Original language</mark>English

Abstract

In a ‘post-truth’ era in which personality and opinion trump evidence and reason, the need for frankness in debates about the use and boundaries of science and policy is high. We welcome the reflective and nuanced approach to behavioural science in policy-making in Sanders, Snijders and Hallsworth's (2018) piece. Despite our support for the approach in this paper, we suggest that there are deeper issues than are currently acknowledged. Our critique tackles three issues: the empirical, the normative and the political. In the first section, we examine what counts as ‘behavioural’ and how this label is used to legitimate a range of policy activities. We then look at randomised controlled trials in the next section, highlighting the extra-scientific dimensions of the empirical ‘What Works’ revolution. Finally, we question some ontological assumptions that drive empirical research and its translation into policy, asking where the collective is to be found in behavioural public policy.

Bibliographic note

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/behavioural-public-policy/article/three-challenges-for-behavioural-science-and-policy-the-empirical-the-normative-and-the-political/6934E3ED1A1FE1E5714A9309BB73D1A6 The final, definitive version of this article has been published in the Journal, Behavioural Public Policy, 2 (2), pp 174-182 2018, © 2018 Cambridge University Press.