{"title":"Imaginary of Behavioral Governing","authors":"Magdalena Małecka","doi":"10.1215/08992363-10742509","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The article introduces the concept of the imaginary of behavioral governing to capture the view on the role of behavioral research in governing behavior that is widely shared in the academic and public discussions about behavioral policy (nudging), including the recent debates about reliance on big data and algorithms to influence people's behavior. It is believed that behavioral science provides knowledge of stable regularities of behavior and of the cognitive processes that lead to them, and that policymakers/governments act upon this knowledge to change behavior of individuals. I argue that this set of claims about the knowledge provided by the behavioral sciences is not substantiated in behavioral research. The formal theoretical frameworks of behavioral science come to be interpreted—via the imaginary of behavioral governing—as relating to human agents that power can act upon. I reflect on the possible point of entry for critique of this imaginary and its effects.","PeriodicalId":47901,"journal":{"name":"Public Culture","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.1000,"publicationDate":"2023-11-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Public Culture","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1215/08992363-10742509","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"ANTHROPOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Abstract The article introduces the concept of the imaginary of behavioral governing to capture the view on the role of behavioral research in governing behavior that is widely shared in the academic and public discussions about behavioral policy (nudging), including the recent debates about reliance on big data and algorithms to influence people's behavior. It is believed that behavioral science provides knowledge of stable regularities of behavior and of the cognitive processes that lead to them, and that policymakers/governments act upon this knowledge to change behavior of individuals. I argue that this set of claims about the knowledge provided by the behavioral sciences is not substantiated in behavioral research. The formal theoretical frameworks of behavioral science come to be interpreted—via the imaginary of behavioral governing—as relating to human agents that power can act upon. I reflect on the possible point of entry for critique of this imaginary and its effects.
期刊介绍：
Public Culture is a peer-reviewed interdisciplinary journal of cultural studies, published three times a year—in January, May, and September. It is sponsored by the Department of Media, Culture, and Communication, NYU. A four-time CELJ award winner, Public Culture has been publishing field-defining ethnographies and analyses of the cultural politics of globalization for over thirty years. The journal provides a forum for the discussion of the places and occasions where cultural, social, and political differences emerge as public phenomena, manifested in everything from highly particular and localized events in popular or folk culture to global advertising, consumption, and information networks. Artists, activists, and scholars, both well-established and younger, from across the humanities and social sciences and around the world, present some of their most innovative and exciting work in the pages of Public Culture.
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