The challenges and opportunities of 'nudging'

Abstract

This article discusses libertarian paternalism, the philosophical stance of a behavioural economics inspired policy intervention in the health domain. Based on the very foundations of behavioural economics, we make two claims: on the one hand, interventions on choice architectures are not neutral because every policy measure includes an interpersonal comparison of preferences; on the other hand, 'nudging' should not be understood as an escape from addressing structural intervention (e.g. interventions on socio economic determinants of health), as the main tenet of behavioural economics is that preferences are context dependent and as such influenced by socio-economic background.