Article contents
Making Law Effective: Behavioural Insights into Compliance
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 November 2018
Abstract
This paper investigates traditional and new tools for increasing the effectiveness of rules and enforcement strategies. As a preliminary concern, it underlines that there are two sides to effectiveness that cannot be approached separately: effectiveness as perfect compliance with the terms of rules, and effectiveness as a result of rules which incentivise behaviours to meet the “spirit of the law”. In order to achieve this comprehensive approach to effectiveness, rules must be evidence-based, plain, understandable and accepted. Moreover, a clear understanding of compliance drivers is needed. Deterrence and all other possible motivations that go beyond the rational calculus should be assessed by decision-makers, such as internal motivation, procedural fairness, cooperation, social norms, heuristics and bias. Enriching the rationality assumption with other drivers of compliance does not mean dismissing traditional rules or enforcement tools, which conversely remain crucial for the purpose of supporting voluntary compliance and for preventing non-compliance. However, deterrence should be calibrated by a risk-based, responsive and proportional approach to (simplified) rules and enforcement strategies. Trust in public authorities, supportive and cooperative public administrations are also fundamental in order to increase voluntary compliance, and a cognitive-based approach should complement these views.
- Type
- Symposium on Effective Law and Regulation
- Information
- European Journal of Risk Regulation , Volume 9 , Issue 3: Symposium on Effective Law and Regulation , September 2018 , pp. 483 - 501
- Copyright
- © Cambridge University Press
Footnotes
Lumsa University, Law and Economics.
References
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70 European Commission, Toolbox on Better Regulation (2017) p 85.
71 The performance of an ad hoc experiment is to be considered the preferred approach, while interventions drafted on the basis of a literature review alone do not avoid ineffectiveness: European Commission, Behavioural Insight Applied Policy (2016) p 17.
72 Therefore, if the regulatory problem is a low switching rate, those invited should not be only firms and associations of consumers, but also individual consumers. Inertia bias could also prevent stakeholders from participation in consultation (therefore, the consultation method should be selected accordingly, for instance inviting consumers to seminars, organising online forum, or providing simplified questionnaires).
73 Such as information overload (which could stop people from answering documents which are too long and complicated) or choice overload (which could paralyse people confronted by too many alternatives); overconfidence (which prevents people from neutrally evaluating their own ability or attitude), or confirmation (which leads people to select information which confirms their belief, while not paying attention to a different view).
74 For instance, while impact assessment (IA) based on cost-benefit analysis usually assumes people’s rationality, IA should include a risk analysis which takes into account end-users’ biases as a risk to be assessed in terms of probability and effects: Di Porto, F and Rangone, N, “Behavioural Sciences in Practice: Lessons for EU Policymakers” in A Alemanno and A-L Sibony (eds), Nudge and the Law: A European Perspective? (Hart 2015) 33 Google Scholar.
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76 On weaknesses and strengths of traditional and cognitive-based regulatory strategies see Di Porto and Rangone, supra, note 74, 55–56.
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78 This distinction has been pointed out in 2015 by Di Porto and Rangone, supra, note 74, 36 ff., where a classification of types of nudging and empowerment is given, along with many examples). Cass R Sunstein introduced the similar notion of “educative nudges” in The Ethics of Influence: Government in the Age of Behavioral Science (Cambridge University Press 2016) first mentioned at p 16) and T Grüne-Yanoff and R Hertwig that of “boost”, in “Nudge versus boost: How coherent are policy and theory?” (2016) 26(1–2) Minds and Machines 149 et sqq.
79 C Codagnone et al, “Study on online gambling and adequate measures for the protection on consumers of gambling services”, Final Report for the European Commission (2014) pp 20–21 and 61–62.
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82 For instance, the introduction of a given choice for architectures in canteens or supermarket in the well-known example described in the best seller by Thaler, RH and Sunstein, CR, Nudge. Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness (Yale University Press 2008) 67 Google Scholar.
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86 The personal reference point is a psychological criterion or heuristic that guides decision-making processes by setting a standard against which to compare the choice: Kahneman, D and Tversky, A, “Prospect theory: an analysis of decision under risk” (1979) 47(2) Econometrica 263 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
87 “Recently created business should be (...) first given a chance to improve (…) so as to promote a culture of openness on their side. (…) Businesses which have a history of compliance should be gradually checked less often (their risk level being rated lower) – inspectors should also generally start with improvement notices or (in the case of lesser violations) verbal warnings, except in cases of major, imminent hazard” (OECD, Regulatory Enforcement and Inspections (2014) pp 28 and 34, inspired by the theory of responsive regulation developed by Ayres and Braithwaite).
88 Education, persuasion and dialogue are strategic in order to gain and maintain compliance of most taxpayers; “however, in the case of voluntary and repeated non-cooperation, severe economic and legal sanctions come into operation”: Kirchler, E and Hoelzl, E, “Modelling Taxpayers’ Behaviour as a Function of Interaction Between Tax Authorities and Taxpayers” in E Elfers, P Verboon and W Huisman (eds), Managing and Maintaining Compliance (Boom Legal Publisher 2006) 5–6 Google Scholar. At the same time, public authorities should react differently to “active tax fraud by manipulation of the balance sheet, and passive tax evasion when taxpayers forget to report particular income components”, according to the responsive regulation approach: Feld, LP and Frey, BS , “ Tax Compliance as the Result of a Psychological Tax Contract: The Role of Incentives and Responsive Regulation” (2007) 29(1) Law & Policy 109 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
89 In the tax sector, it has been demonstrated that more auditing can backfire (while compliance increases until a certain auditing level, it decreases beyond that level). The reduced compliance is due to distrust created in taxpayers and by the perception that the tax authority and its enforcement actions are excessive and unfair: Mendoza, JP, Wielhouwer, JL and Kirchler, E, “The backfiring effect of auditing on tax compliance” (2017) 62(11) Journal of Economic Psychology 284 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
90 For instance, the “inspection holiday” puts a frequency cap on inspections for businesses with track records of accountability which are rewarded with fewer inspections focusing controls on “bad performer” firms: R de Boer, Regulatory Enforcement and Inspections. Dutch Approach, October 2012). A similar recommendation is formulated by the OECD, which suggests limiting “re-inspection of the same issue by different inspectorates in the same business within a given period (eg one year), except if problems have been identified in the first visit”: OECD, supra, note 6, 44.
91 Cialdini (1984), supra, note 63; Nolan et al, supra, note 62, 249 et sqq.
92 The Food Hygiene Rating Scheme, which has worked successfully in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, was launched in 2010, in New York City in 2010, in Los Angeles in 1998.
93 Data from 2013 shows that “the majority of these systems are mandatory (Denmark, Canada (Toronto), USA (New York, Los Angeles, San Diego, Ohio, Kentucky), Singapore, and New Zealand, with semi-voluntary systems existing in the UK (England, Wales, Northern Island, Scotland)”: NSW Food Authority, Progress of “Scores on Doors” (Food Hygiene Rating Scheme) in NSW (June 2013) CP069/1306.
94 More than 20 US states have shaming lists on the internet, eg New York, <www.tax.ny.gov/enforcement/warrants.htm> accessed 6 September 2018; Florida <floridarevenue.com/taxes/compliance/Pages/delinquent_taxpayer.aspx>, accessed 6 September 2018.
95 For instance, the UK HM Revenue and Customs published in 2013 a photo gallery of the Most Wanted tax fugitives: see <www.gov.uk/government/news/hmrcs-most-wanted-gallery-of-tax-fugitives-published-as-another-caught>, accessed 6 September 2018.
96 Establishing whether targeted transparency based on a positive framing is more effective than a negative one is something that should be established through ad hoc cognitive experiments.
97 It is important to underline that none of the abovementioned theories on compliance suggest a new model of human behaviour; alternatively to building an overarching model of man, Frey, supra, note 31, at 124 suggests leaving “the partial models including some specific psychological effects as they are, and regulates the task of choosing the appropriate model to the problem at hand”.
98 It is not the purpose of this paper to determine whether the preferred theories are those that build on the Simon’s notion of bounded rationality (eg Tversky and Kahneman, supra, note 9; Thaler and Sunstein, supra, note 82; and, among others, Bobb, R and Pildes, RH, “How behavioural economics trims its sails and why” (2014) 127 Harward Law Review 1612)Google Scholar, or the approaches which “presume rationality when evidence [of biased behavours] is lacking”: Schwartz, supra, note 3, at 1405–1406; in this line of thinking see also, among others, Frey, supra, note 31). However it seems to be unquestioned that cognitive findings lead to a richer and “more psychological model of human behaviour” (ibid, 118).
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