Harvard University
To promote interdepartmental, intergovernmental, and international cooperation on policy-relevant research by behavioral scientists
Behavioral economics should have many implications for government policy. With this motivation, the Prime Minister’s Office in the U.K. established a Behavioral Insights Team (BIT) in 2010 to help bring insights from behavioral economics to the design and evaluation of government policy. The BIT’s successes in a wide variety of areas—from tax collection to energy efficiency to organ donation—have inspired other countries to launch similar initiatives, including Australia, the Netherlands, Israel, and the United States. The academics and government officials leading such efforts have much to gain by comparing notes with one another. This grant funds a joint effort by David Halpern, head of the BIT in the U.K., and Max Bazerman, head of the Behavioral Insights Group (BIG) at Harvard, to organize a series of meetings, international conferences, and advanced courses that will bring together researchers from all over the globe to exchange the latest insights on the intersection of behavioral research and public policy.