Do Good Laws Make Good Citizens? An Economic Analysis of Internalized Norms

Cooter, Robert D.

doi:10.2307/1073825

Cited by 133 publications

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“…Yet long-standing compulsory voting laws may also change higher-order preferences for political participation in other types of political collective action for which engagement remained voluntary. According to Cooter (2000), long-term enforced compliance with a legal norm, e.g., adhering to speed limits for cars sanctioned by speeding tickets, will induce individuals to internalize a norm that prescribes more careful behavior in traffic more generally, e.g., when riding a bike or walking. In the realm of political behavior, political participation may also have such spillover effects.…”

Section: Compulsory Voting and Habit Formationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The habit-formation argument assumes that individuals' preferences, in particular those of younger persons, are socially programmable (Gintis 2003;Cooter 2000;Weber 1968;Ross 1896 The number of individuals eligible to vote equaled about 101,000. Thus, if only half of the younger age cohorts that had been socialized under compulsory voting developed a habit to turn out, we would expect a persistent effect on turnout of about 22 percentage points in the post-treatment period.…”

Section: Long-term Effectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This habit-formation argument not only predicts the contemporaneous effect of compulsory voting on turnout in elections. It also suggests that compulsory voting has broader positive spillover effects on other types of political participation and has a lasting, positive impact on the level of civic engagement in a political system even after it has been abolished (Lijphart 1997;Cooter 2000;Fieldhouse and Cutts 2012).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Compulsory Voting, Habit Formation, and Political Participation

Bechtel

Hangartner

Schmid

2018

The Review of Economics and Statistics

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Section: Compulsory Voting and Habit Formationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Long-term Effectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Compulsory Voting, Habit Formation, and Political Participation

Bechtel

Hangartner

Schmid

2018

The Review of Economics and Statistics

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“…For example, people donate anonymously to charities (Eckel and Grossman 1996), they vote for reasons of civic duty, despite their vote being extremely unlikely pivotal (Riker and Ordeshook 1968); they respect the law (Cooter 2000) also if incentives that back up the obligations are weak (Galbiati and Vertova 2008). People pay their taxes despite low detection probabilities for evasion (Kirchler 2007), and people also care for the environment out of moral convictions (Brekke, Kipperberg, and Nyborg 2010 interesting field study) and also act on perceived moral obligations (Schwartz 1977).…”

Section: The Determinants Of Social Order I: Internalized Normsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human Prosocial Motivation and the Maintenance of Social Order

Gächter¹

2014

The Oxford Handbook of Behavioral Economics and the Law

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in AbstractThis chapter presents some insights from basic behavioural research on the role of human pro-social motivation to maintain social order. I argue that social order can be conceptualised as a public good game. Past attempts to explain social order typically relied on the assumption of selfish and rational agents ("homo economicus"). The last twenty years of research in behavioural and experimental economics have challenged this view. After presenting the most important findings of recent research on human pro-sociality I discuss the evidence on three pillars of the maintenance of social order. The first pillar is internalised norms of cooperation, sustained by emotions such as guilt and shame. The second pillar is the behaviour of other people who typically are "conditional cooperators" willing to cooperate if others do so as well. This motivation can sustain cooperation if enough people cooperate but can jeopardise social order if many others follow selfish inclinations. The third pillar are sanctions meted out to anyone who does not cooperate; ideally punishment can work as a mere threat without being executed much. The chapter also presents some evidence on the cross-cultural variability of some findings, in particular with regard to punishment behaviour. The chapter concludes with remarks on future research.

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“…There can be preexisting levels of guilt and pride for the behavior embodied in the law, but upon being codified, those levels are increased if legislation is expressive. If the legislation is not expressive, then those levels remain unaffected (Cooter 2000). Similarly, a person can permit a new law to update their interpersonal relations which govern their willingness to disapprove or approve of another person's noncompliance or compliance.…”

Section: Agent Relationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

After the sunset: the residual effect of temporary legislation

Fagan

2011

Eur J Law Econ

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The difference between permanent legislation and temporary legislation is the default rule of termination: permanent legislation governs perpetually, while temporary legislation governs for a limited time. Recent literature on legislative timing rules considers the effect of temporary legislation to stop at the moment of expiration. When the law expires, so does its regulatory effect. This article extends that literature by examining the effect of temporary legislation beyond its expiration. We show that in addition to affecting compliance behavior which depends on statutory enforcement, temporary legislation also affects compliance behavior which does not depend on statutory enforcement, and more generally, organizational behavior after a sunset. When temporary legislation expires therefore, it can continue to administer regulatory and other effects. We specify the conditions for this process and give the optimal legislative response.

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Do Good Laws Make Good Citizens? An Economic Analysis of Internalized Norms

Abstract: In a private communication with me, legal historian James Gordley asserts that few pre-modern scholars questioned the belief that the health of the state reflects the virtue of its citizens. As a possible exception, he offers Machiavelli.

Cited by 133 publications

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Compulsory Voting, Habit Formation, and Political Participation

Compulsory Voting, Habit Formation, and Political Participation

Human Prosocial Motivation and the Maintenance of Social Order

After the sunset: the residual effect of temporary legislation

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