Overview

Currently, the dominant enforcement paradigm is based on the idea that states deal with 'bad people' - or those pursuing their own self-interests - with laws that exact a price for misbehavior through sanctions and punishment. At the same time, by contrast, behavioral ethics posits that 'good people' are guided by cognitive processes and biases that enable them to bend the laws within the confines of their conscience. In this illuminating book, Yuval Feldman analyzes these paradigms and provides a broad theoretical and empirical comparison of traditional and non-traditional enforcement mechanisms to advance our understanding of how states can better deal with misdeeds committed by normative citizens blinded by cognitive biases regarding their own ethicality. By bridging the gap between new findings of behavioral ethics and traditional methods used to modify behavior, Feldman proposes a 'law of good people' that should be read by scholars and policymakers around the world.

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9781107137103

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Reviews

A fascinating, comprehensive exploration of the complexities of human motivations - and of how to get good people to do really good things. Opens up new vistas in behavioral science, and also in public policy. Highly recommended. Cass R. Sunstein, Harvard University More than 40 years ago, economics revolutionized legal theory by analyzing the incentive effects of laws on people who are rationally self-interested. In recent years, cognitive psychology revolutionized law and economics by showing how legal incentives affect real people who are psychological, not purely rational. In The Law of Good People, Yuval Feldman provides a fresh perspective on laws aimed at motivating good people, as opposed to just deterring bad people. His creativity and knowledge of law, economics, and psychology will make readers rethink the incentive effects of laws and current theories of law and economics. Robert Cooter, Berkeley Law School In mid-20th century, Hannah Arendt was criticized for speaking about the banality of evil in describing Adolf Eichmann, and even today Stanley Milgram's experiments showing the ease of ordering people to harm others is difficult to comprehend. Since then, psychological evidence has accumulated, revealing the undeniable daily harms that emerge from the unintended actions of good people. In this excellent book, Yuval Feldman brings all the best research to those interested in imagining the good society. He admirably polishes the grimy results of behavioral science experiments until they shine with solutions for political and legal reform. It is rare to see a scholar write with the broad sweep Feldman does, and even rarer to have one so effectively persuade that central concepts in the law - property, conflict of interest, discrimination - cannot remain in their present form if only we would confront the evidence already before us. Mahzarin R. Banaji, Harvard University Should the law target the infamous Mr. Hyde? No, says Yuval Feldman, who demonstrates why most individuals are not hard-nosed Mr. Hydes. In fact, the law should be much more concerned with Dr. Jekyll, who could turn into Mr. Hyde at all times, but who will nevertheless convince himself that he remains the good-natured Dr. Jekyll. In short, motivational plasticity, as Feldman explains, is a much bigger normative problem than merely being a 'bad person' in the first place. This book not only alerts legal academia to this idea, but also carefully discusses the implications for legal analysis and design. Christoph Engel, Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods This book is the first to introduce the large and heterogeneous body of work on behavioral ethics to the world of law and legal policy. Drawing in part on the author's own pioneering experimental work, the book moves beyond the reigning enforcement-based approach with its focus on cognition and deliberation, and takes greater account of complex motivations, especially of people with a self-conception as being a good person. Feldman provides an important first installment on evaluating law and related interventions in the light of this promising new paradigm. Henry Smith, Harvard Law School Weaving in disparate threads of economics and psychology, Professor Feldman delivers an exciting new approach to our understanding of ethical behavior. The implications of this work will influence our understanding of how to regulate good and evil for many years to come Jeffrey Rachlinski, Cornell Law School

'A fascinating, comprehensive exploration of the complexities of human motivations - and of how to get good people to do really good things. Opens up new vistas in behavioral science, and also in public policy. Highly recommended.' Cass R. Sunstein, Harvard University, Massachusetts 'More than 40 years ago, economics revolutionized legal theory by analyzing the incentive effects of laws on people who are rationally self-interested. In recent years, cognitive psychology revolutionized law and economics by showing how legal incentives affect real people who are psychological, not purely rational. In The Law of Good People, Yuval Feldman provides a fresh perspective on laws aimed at motivating good people, as opposed to just deterring bad people. His creativity and knowledge of law, economics, and psychology will make readers rethink the incentive effects of laws and current theories of law and economics.' Robert Cooter, Berkeley Law School 'In the mid-twentieth century, Hannah Arendt was criticized for speaking about the banality of evil in describing Adolf Eichmann, and even today Stanley Milgram's experiments showing the ease of ordering people to harm others is difficult to comprehend. Since then, psychological evidence has accumulated, revealing the undeniable daily harms that emerge from the unintended actions of 'good' people. In this excellent book, Yuval Feldman brings all the best research to those interested in imagining the good society. He admirably polishes the grimy results of behavioral science experiments until they shine with solutions for political and legal reform. It is rare to see a scholar write with the broad sweep Feldman does, and even rarer to have one so effectively persuade that central concepts in the law - property, conflict of interest, discrimination - cannot remain in their present form if only we would confront the evidence already before us.' Mahzarin R. Banaji, Harvard University, Massachusetts 'Should the law target the infamous Mr Hyde? No, says Yuval Feldman, who demonstrates why most individuals are not hard-nosed Mr Hydes. In fact, the law should be much more concerned with Dr Jekyll, who could turn into Mr Hyde at all times, but who will nevertheless convince himself that he remains the good-natured Dr Jekyll. In short, motivational plasticity, as Feldman explains, is a much bigger normative problem than merely being a 'bad person' in the first place. This book not only alerts legal academia to this idea, but also carefully discusses the implications for legal analysis and design.' Christoph Engel, Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods 'This book is the first to introduce the large and heterogeneous body of work on behavioral ethics to the world of law and legal policy. Drawing in part on the author's own pioneering experimental work, the book moves beyond the reigning enforcement-based approach with its focus on cognition and deliberation, and takes greater account of complex motivations, especially of people with a self-conception as being a good person. Feldman provides an important first installment on evaluating law and related interventions in the light of this promising new paradigm.' Henry Smith, Harvard Law School 'Weaving in disparate threads of economics and psychology, Professor Feldman delivers an exciting new approach to our understanding of ethical behavior. The implications of this work will influence our understanding of how to regulate good and evil for many years to come.' Jeffrey Rachlinski, Cornell Law School 'By bridging the gap between new findings of behavioral ethics and traditional methods used to modify behavior, Professor Feldman proposes a 'law of good people' that should be read by scholars and policymakers around the world. A work of simply brilliant scholarship, 'The Law of Good People' is a fully engaging, thought-provoking, informed and informative study that is unreservedly recommended for community and academic library Political Science, Judicial, and Contemporary Sociology collections and supplemental studies lists.' http://www.midwestbookreview.com 'In The Law of Good People: Challenging States' Ability to Regulate Human Behavior, Feldman's goal is to 'create a new branch of scholarship that focuses on the rule of law in a world populated by individuals with different levels of awareness of their own unethicality'. ... The Law of Good People is a foundational work and as such it is a springboard rather than an ending. Feldman points to a host of thought-provoking questions in need of further research and deliberations, such as, 'How blind is a blind spot from a legal perspective of responsibility?' and 'Can we know ex ante in what mode of reasoning people will be when making a decision about the law?'. Many young scholars, and quite a few older ones, will find this book highly stimulating, inviting new thinking, and new lines of research as well as legal policy.' Amitay Ezioni, Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies `A fascinating, comprehensive exploration of the complexities of human motivations - and of how to get good people to do really good things. Opens up new vistas in behavioral science, and also in public policy. Highly recommended.' Cass R. Sunstein, Harvard University, Massachusetts `More than 40 years ago, economics revolutionized legal theory by analyzing the incentive effects of laws on people who are rationally self-interested. In recent years, cognitive psychology revolutionized law and economics by showing how legal incentives affect real people who are psychological, not purely rational. In The Law of Good People, Yuval Feldman provides a fresh perspective on laws aimed at motivating good people, as opposed to just deterring bad people. His creativity and knowledge of law, economics, and psychology will make readers rethink the incentive effects of laws and current theories of law and economics.' Robert Cooter, Berkeley Law School `In the mid-twentieth century, Hannah Arendt was criticized for speaking about the banality of evil in describing Adolf Eichmann, and even today Stanley Milgram's experiments showing the ease of ordering people to harm others is difficult to comprehend. Since then, psychological evidence has accumulated, revealing the undeniable daily harms that emerge from the unintended actions of `good' people. In this excellent book, Yuval Feldman brings all the best research to those interested in imagining the good society. He admirably polishes the grimy results of behavioral science experiments until they shine with solutions for political and legal reform. It is rare to see a scholar write with the broad sweep Feldman does, and even rarer to have one so effectively persuade that central concepts in the law - property, conflict of interest, discrimination - cannot remain in their present form if only we would confront the evidence already before us.' Mahzarin R. Banaji, Harvard University, Massachusetts `Should the law target the infamous Mr Hyde? No, says Yuval Feldman, who demonstrates why most individuals are not hard-nosed Mr Hydes. In fact, the law should be much more concerned with Dr Jekyll, who could turn into Mr Hyde at all times, but who will nevertheless convince himself that he remains the good-natured Dr Jekyll. In short, motivational plasticity, as Feldman explains, is a much bigger normative problem than merely being a `bad person' in the first place. This book not only alerts legal academia to this idea, but also carefully discusses the implications for legal analysis and design.' Christoph Engel, Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods `This book is the first to introduce the large and heterogeneous body of work on behavioral ethics to the world of law and legal policy. Drawing in part on the author's own pioneering experimental work, the book moves beyond the reigning enforcement-based approach with its focus on cognition and deliberation, and takes greater account of complex motivations, especially of people with a self-conception as being a good person. Feldman provides an important first installment on evaluating law and related interventions in the light of this promising new paradigm.' Henry Smith, Harvard Law School `Weaving in disparate threads of economics and psychology, Professor Feldman delivers an exciting new approach to our understanding of ethical behavior. The implications of this work will influence our understanding of how to regulate good and evil for many years to come.' Jeffrey Rachlinski, Cornell Law School 'By bridging the gap between new findings of behavioral ethics and traditional methods used to modify behavior, Professor Feldman proposes a 'law of good people' that should be read by scholars and policymakers around the world. A work of simply brilliant scholarship, 'The Law of Good People' is a fully engaging, thought-provoking, informed and informative study that is unreservedly recommended for community and academic library Political Science, Judicial, and Contemporary Sociology collections and supplemental studies lists.' http://www.midwestbookreview.com 'In The Law of Good People: Challenging States' Ability to Regulate Human Behavior, Feldman's goal is to 'create a new branch of scholarship that focuses on the rule of law in a world populated by individuals with different levels of awareness of their own unethicality'. ... The Law of Good People is a foundational work and as such it is a springboard rather than an ending. Feldman points to a host of thought-provoking questions in need of further research and deliberations, such as, 'How blind is a blind spot from a legal perspective of responsibility?' and 'Can we know ex ante in what mode of reasoning people will be when making a decision about the law?'. Many young scholars, and quite a few older ones, will find this book highly stimulating, inviting new thinking, and new lines of research as well as legal policy.' Amitay Ezioni, Institute for Communitarian Policy Studies

Author Information

Yuval Feldman is the Mori Lazarof Professor of Legal Research at Bar-Ilan University, Israel. He holds a Ph.D. in Jurisprudence and Social Policy from the University of California, Berkeley (2004). His research focuses on compliance, ethical decision-making, and empirical legal studies. He has co-authored more than fifty papers and has won more than twenty research grants and fellowships, including one at the Safra Lab at Harvard Law School. Feldman is a Senior Fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, where he advises various governmental bodies on the usage of behavioral sciences, in areas related to regulatory design, corruption and enforcement. In 2016 he was elected to the Israel Young Academy.

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