(2018). Review of: ‘Samuel Bowles, The Moral Economy. Why Good Incentives Are No Good Substitute for Good Citizens. New Haven, Yale University Press’, Journal of Applied Philosophy. (original) (raw)

The paradigmatic problem this book tackles is how to persuade citizens to contribute to a public good when it is costly to them. Such collective action problems are omnipresent in our society: voluntary payment of taxes, voting, limiting car use, restraining antibiotics use, etc. Bowles' book presents an encompassing overview of current empirical research, especially in behavioural economics, on the question of the effect of incentives. While it discusses a lot of empirical research, the book is at the same time closely related to the field of political and applied philosophy. To begin with, Bowles explicitly connects this research with larger debates in the history of political thought. Secondly, his overview and conclusions seem to be very relevant for anyone thinking about the interactions between motivations, values and policies.

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