Accueil » Numéros » 2015/2 (Vol. 16) – Varia » From Utilitarianism to Paternalism: When Behavioral Economics meets Moral Philosophy

From Utilitarianism to Paternalism: When Behavioral Economics meets Moral Philosophy

Cyril Hédoin

Résumé

La plupart des économistes comportementaux considèrent que leurs résultats expérimentaux ont des implications normatives de nature paternalistes. Ces derniers tendent en effet à défendre l’idée que les résultats de l’économie comportementale impliquent logiquement l’extension du champ d’intervention de l’État dans le fonctionnement de l’économie de marché. Cet article montre que cette conclusion dépend d’un raisonnement normatif implicite difficilement défendable en raison de l’adhésion de l’économie comportementale à l’économie du bien-être standard. On propose une reconstruction de la défense du paternalisme par les économistes comportementaux en termes de fonction de bien-être social comportementale à maximiser et tenant compte du fait que les individus font des choix incohérents. Cependant, cette défense nécessite une théorie des préférences rationnelles dont l’économie comportementale est dépourvue. Il est de plus montré que la défense du paternalisme dans un cadre welfariste amène à ignorer la dimension de la personne en tant qu’agent. D’autres défenses du paternalisme sont envisageables mais elles impliquent en toute probabilité l’abandon par l’économie comportementale normative du welfarisme.

Plan

  • Introduction
  • The logical argument for soft paternalism
  • Constructing the behavioral social welfare function
  • Rational preferences and the weighing of the selves
  • Deconstructing the individual: a self is not an agent
  • Conclusion

Article

[L’article peut être lu en intégralité sur Cairn]

Références

  • Bénabou, R. & Tirole, J. 2002. “Self-Confidence and Personal Motivation”. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 117(3), 871-915.
  • Berg, N. & Gigerenzer, G. 2010. As-If Behavioral Economics: Neoclassical Economics in Disguise?, Rochester, NY: Social Science Research Network. Available at: http://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=1677168.
  • En ligneBernheim, B.D. & Rangel, A. 2007. “Toward Choice-Theoretic Foundations for Behavioral Welfare Economics”. The American Economic Review, 97(2), 464-470.
  • Bernheim, B.D. & Rangel, A. 2008. “Choice-Theoretic Foundations for Behavioral Welfare Economics”. In A. Caplin & A. Schotter (eds.), The Foundations of Positive and Normative Economics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 155-192.
  • En ligneBernheim, B.D. & Rangel, A. 2009. “Beyond Revealed Preference: Choice-Theoretic Foundations for Behavioral Welfare Economics”. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 124/1, 51-104.
  • En ligneBhattacharyya, A., Pattanaik, P. & Xu, Y. 2011. “Choice, Internal Consistency and Rationality”. Economics and Philosophy, 27/2, 123-49.
  • En ligneBroome, J. 1993. “A cause of preference is not an object of preference”. Social Choice and Welfare, 10/1, 57-68.
  • En ligneCamerer, C. et al. 2003. “Regulation for Conservatives: Behavioral Economics and the Case for ‘Asymmetric Paternalism’”. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 151/3, 1211.
  • Damasio, A. 1994. Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason and the Human Brain, New York: Putnam.
  • En ligneDasgupta, P. & Maskin, E. 2005. “Uncertainty and Hyperbolic Discounting”. The American Economic Review, 95/4, 1290-1299.
  • Davis, J.B. 2011. Individuals and Identity in Economics, Cambridge: CUP.
  • Dietrich, F. & List, C. 2012. “Mentalism versus behaviourism in economics”. Working paper.
  • Dworkin, G. 2010. “Paternalism”. In E. N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Available at: http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2010/entries/paternalism/.
  •  En ligneFerey, S. 2011. “Paternalisme libéral et pluralité du moi”. Revue économique, 62/4, 737-750.
  • En ligneGigerenzer, G. & Selten, R. (eds.). 2002. Bounded Rationality: The Adaptive Toolbox, Cambridge: The MIT Press.
  • En ligneGilboa, I. & Schmeidler, D. 2001, A Theory of Case-Based Decisions, Cambridge: CUP.
  • En ligneGrüne-Yanoff, T. 2012. “Old Wine in New Casks: Libertarian Paternalism Still Violates Liberal Principles”. Social Choice and Welfare, 38/4, 635-645.
  • Gul, F. & Pesendorfer, W. 2008. The Case for Mindless Economics. In A. Caplin & A. Schotter (eds.), The Foundations of Positive and Normative Economics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4-39.
  • En ligneHarsanyi, J.C. 1955. “Cardinal Welfare, Individualistic Ethics, and Interpersonal Comparisons of Utility”. Journal of Political Economy, 63/4, 309-321.
  • En ligneHarsanyi, J.C. 1977. Rational Behaviour and Bargaining Equilibrium in Games and Social Situations, Cambridge: CUP Archive.
  • En ligneHarsanyi, J.C. 1996. “Utilities, preferences, and substantive goods”. Social Choice and Welfare, 14/1, 129-145.
  • En ligneHausman, D.M. & McPherson, M.S. 2006. Economic Analysis, Moral Philosophy and Public Policy 2 e éd., Cambridge: CUP.
  • En ligneKahneman, D., Wakker, P. P. & Sarin, R. 1997. “Back to Bentham? Explorations of Experienced Utility”. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 112/2, 375-406.
  • Korsgaard, C. 1989. “Personal identity and the unity of agency: A Kantian response to Parfit”. Philosophy and Public Affairs, 18/2, 101-132.
  • Layard, R. 2006. Happiness: Lessons from a New Science, New York: Penguin Books.
  • En ligneLivnat, A. & Pippenger, N. 2006. “An optimal brain can be composed of conflicting agents”. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 103/9, 3198-3202.
  • Loewenstein, G. & Haisley, E. 2008. “The Economist as Therapist: Methodological Ramifications of ‘Light Paternalism’”. In A. Caplin & A. Schotter (eds.), The Foundations of Positive and Normative Economics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 210-245.
  • En ligneMcQuillin, B. & Sugden, R. 2012a. How the market responds to dynamically inconsistent preferences. Social Choice and Welfare, 38(4), 617-634.
  • En ligneMcQuillin, B. & Sugden, R. 2012b. “Reconciling normative and behavioural economics: the problems to be solved”. Social Choice and Welfare, 38/4, 553-567.
  • En ligneNagel, T. 1971. “Brain Bisection and the Unity of Consciousness”. Synthese, 22/3-4, 396-413.
  • Nagel, T. 1986. The View From Nowhere, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • En ligneO’Donoghue, T. & Rabin, M. 2003. “Studying Optimal Paternalism, Illustrated by a Model of Sin Taxes”. The American Economic Review, 93/2, 186-191.
  • En ligneO’Donoghue, T. & Rabin, M. 2006. “Optimal sin taxes”. Journal of Public Economics, 90/10-11, 1825-1849.
  • Parfit, D. 1984. Reasons and Persons, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Parfit, D. 2011. On What Matters:Volume One, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • En ligneQizilbash, M. 2012. “Informed desire and the ambitions of libertarian paternalism”. Social Choice and Welfare, 38, 647-658.
  • En ligneRailton, P. 1986. “Moral Realism”. The Philosophical Review, 95, 163-207.
  • En ligneRobson, A.J. 2001. “The Biological Basis of Economic Behavior”. Journal of Economic Literature, 39/1, 11-33.
  • En ligneRobson, A.J. & Samuelson, L. 2007. “The Evolution of Intertemporal Preferences”. The American Economic Review, 97/2, 496-500.
  • Ross, D. 2005. Economic Theory And Cognitive Science: Microexplanation, Cambridge: The MIT Press.
  • En ligneRoss, D. et al. 2008. Midbrain Mutiny: The Picoeconomics and Neuroeconomics of Disordered Gambling, 1re éd., Cambridge: The MIT Press.
  • Saint-Paul, G. 2011. The Tyranny of Utility: Behavioral Social Science and the Rise of Paternalism, New York: Princeton University Press.
  • Sen, A.K. 1986. “Social Choice Theory”. In K.J. Arrow & M.D. Intriligator (eds.), Handbook of Mathematical Economics, Vol. III, North-Holland, 1073-1181.
  • Sen, A.K. 1987. On Ethics and Economics, Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
  • En ligneSen, A.K. 1997. “Maximization and the Act of Choice”. Econometrica, 65, 745-779.
  • Smith, V.L. 2009. Rationality in Economics: Constructivist and Ecological Forms, 1re éd., Cambridge: CUP.
  • En ligneSugden, R. 1985. “Why be Consistent? A Critical Analysis of Consistency Requirements in Choice Theory”. Economica, 52, 167-183.
  • En ligneSugden, R. 2004. “The Opportunity Criterion: Consumer Sovereignty without the Assumption of Coherent Preferences”. The American Economic Review, 94/4, 1014-1033.
  • En ligneSugden, R. 2008. “Why incoherent preferences do not justify paternalism”. Constitutional Political Economy, 19/3, 226-248.
  • Sugden, R. 2011. The behavioural economist and the social planner: to whom should behavioural welfare economics be addressed?, Max Planck Institute of Economics, Evolutionary Economics Group. Available at: http://ideas.repec.org/p/esi/evopap/2011-21.html.
  • Sunstein, C. & Thaler, R. 2003. Libertarian Paternalism Is Not An Oxymoron, Rochester, NY: Social Science Research Network. Available at: http://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=405940.
  • En ligneThaler, R.H. 1987. “Amomalies: The January Effect”. The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 1/1, 197-201.
  • Thaler, R.H. & Sunstein, C.R. 2009. Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness Revised & Expanded, New Haven: Yale University Press.
  • Weyl, E.G. 2009. “Whose rights? A critique of individual agency as the basis of rights”. Politics, Philosophy & Economics, 8/2, 139-171.
  • Weymark, J. 1991. “A reconsideration of the Harsanyi-Sen debate on utilitarianism”. In J. Elster and J. Roemer (eds.), Interpersonal Comparisons of Well-Being, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 255-320.
  • Whitman, G. 2006. “Against the New Paternalism. Internalities and the Economics of Self-Control”. Policy Analysis, 563, February 22.

Mots-clés

Economie comportementale, Paternalisme « soft », Philosophie morale, Personnalités multiples, Economie du bien-être