Libertarian Paternalism

Introduction Recent researches have shown that people are often subject to making mistakes due to their own cognitive system. Therefore, some behavioural economists, remarkably Cass Sunstein, came up with the idea of “libertarian paternalism” that advocates soft intervention by the government to steer people to make certain decisions. The book, Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness, illustrates how nudging could improve public welfare by recruiting a choice architect. Proponents represent nudging as an effective means to improve individual behaviour regarding to some important decisions from the social level, while this approach is often criticized for ethical issues like manipulation and violation of individual autonomy.

Regardless of the paternalistic tradition in most Eastern countries is theoretically good or bad, the current situation where the public in general does not resist paternalistic policy at least indicates that the application of nudging in China, or even the whole Asia, is promising. In fact, there are already some good designs done in China even before the birth of the concept of nudging. For example, the addition of guidance line for queue to the platform since 2005 clearly does not force passengers waiting in a line, yet has shown significantly positive impact on public order. Since Asian people are less likely to go against well-intentioned government guidance, it can be logical and reasonable to believe that good compatibility of libertarian paternalism and Asian culture, especially Confucianism, may create considerable space and numerous opportunities for

If education is believed to be a reliable way towards a better life, why can’t nudging be? The modest goal of this essay is to encourage people to rethink about nudging, taking into cultural variance into consideration. Since the Confucian paternalism is a fundamental and common traditional cultural norm in Asia, it is right time that the government should take action and adapt to this newer approach, nudging, for a better society. The points that nudges have been questioned in the Western countries are possibly nothing under Confucian culture. More exciting, if Asia starts to pay attention to nudging and tries to adopt it with different cultural values, there could derive interesting, or even gratifying results that in turn may give valuable feedbacks and even significant influences towards the Western