Re: Design, public policy and behaviour

Alison,

> the UK Cabinet Office
> publication ‘Mindspace:
>
<http://www.civilservice.gov.uk/Assets/MINDSPACE-Web-01-03-10_tcm6-35936.pdf>
> Influencing Behaviour Through
> Public Policy’ by LSE
> behavioural economists.

I've been working to deadline, hence away from e-mail for over a week, 
and only just now discovered this.

Thank you so much for passing on the link!

I think it's a really important document, even though I've only had 
time to read thru p. 15 as yet.


> Pretty depressing on the
> impact of information (p.15)

That's because of the either/or framing, I think (says she, after 
reading only 15 pp. ... ;-).

I personally believe a both/and strategy is most effective (as the 
report's authors imply in several places).

One thing that strikes me right off: the report's assumption that 
government's role in influencing behavior is somehow unique to the 
modern state.

It's not.

This sort of governmental influence can be traced back a lot further 
than the era of Hume, to the beginning of the city-state in Western 
Europe.

E.g., the 4 cardinal virtues (prudence, justice, temperance, and 
fortitude) arose in sync with the fifth-century Greek *polis* and the 
ideal constitutions of Plato who, along with the Sophists, made very 
persuasive use of affective appeals (Greek mythology, also symbolism, 
allegory, metaphor, ethos and pathos), plus reason, to convert the 
Athenians to the kind of civic virtue required for *aretê politikê* 
(political excellence) and the development of "moderate democracy".

What's really interesting about this history is that the civic 
projects of the Graeco-Roman period were thoroughly rhetorical, and 
intellectuals like Aristotle were really the first government 
behaviorists. (Hobbes, for instance, always said that Aristotle's 
_Rhetoric_ -- with its innovative insights into human psychology and 
the hidden mechanisms of persuasion -- was his best work.)

If anyone's interested in learning more about the political and 
rhetorical adaptations of the cardinal virtues in classical Athens and 
Rome, I recommend (highly!) Helen North's excellent _From Myth to 
Icon: Reflections of Greek Ethical Doctrine in Literature and Art_ 
(Cornell University Press, 1979). Her book is a true gem in the 
scholarly canon.


I haven't time for more right now, but I just wanted to let you know 
that the MINDSPACE report is also a gem, as far as I'm concerned.

There's a lot here to think about,
Deborah
_____

Deborah Taylor-Pearce
[email protected]



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