The Right Behavioral Technique for the Right Context

This chapter focuses on how to assess the implementation of each available behavioral public policy technique. Challenging the idea of evidence-based behavioral public policy, the main argument of this chapter is that policy decisions regarding the utilization of evidence indicating individuals are not rational, a key aspect of behavioral approaches, should consider the cultural and political context in which these decisions are made. “What works” in one context might not work in another. Therefore, each behavioral technique may be more likely to succeed in specific political contexts or under specific worldviews. Drawing on Mary (Douglas in Risk and blame. Routledge, 2002) cultural theory, the chapter proposes a model in which each specific behavioral technique is more likely to be successful—broadly defining success in terms of both performance and legitimacy aspects—when one of the four cultural types depicted by this model (i.e., individualism, egalitarianism, hierarchy, fatalism) is dominant.