Patronising Paternalism

Paul Burrows

Oxford Economic Papers, 1993, vol. 45, issue 4, 542-72

Abstract: Few economists appear to be able to contemplate a rational basis for government paternalism. This paper considers the basis for the presumption, which permeates contemporary Western economics, that free choice provides a benchmark by which other decision processes should be judged. In the light of the potential obstacles to idealized free choice, the case for paternalistic policy is considered in terms both of an instrumentalist pursuit of welfare gains and of the consequences of paternalism for individual freedom. Copyright 1993 by Royal Economic Society.

Date: 1993
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