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Why empirical social choice?| old_uid | 7976 |
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| title | Why empirical social choice? |
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| start_date | 2010/01/20 |
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| schedule | 13h30-16h |
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| online | no |
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| location_info | 2e étage, salle de conférences R229 |
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| details | Débat introduit par Marc Fleurbaey |
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| summary | Recently a growing number of questionnaire studies has shown that many approaches to justice, which have been developed by economists and philosophers, are far from generally accepted by lay respondents. This raises the question of the normative status of this empirical work: should the definition of justice not be settled by rational debate, rather than by simply following the will of the majority? In this paper we critically discuss the following propositions (in a natural order with respect to the role of empirical work): (a) empirical insights are useful if one wants social choice to have policy relevance; (b) empirical insights may enrich the debate about justice, although the latter should remain essentially “rational”; (c) empirical work is a necessary complement to normative thinking, as it may fill in gaps in our knowledge and may help to take into account intercultural differences; (d) empirical work is essential to the normative debate, as theories of justice are meant to rationalize the arguments that come up in the debate among citizens. The discussion is illustrated with recent examples from the economic literature. |
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| responsibles | Dekeuwer-Carrier, Spranzi, Gateau |
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