Empty Reasons? Evidence from a Natural Experiment on the Effect of Public Reasoning Requirements

Edward H. Stiglitz

The Journal of Legal Studies, 2025, vol. 54, issue 2, 413 - 452

Abstract: Norms of reason-giving rest at the foundation of public institutions, plausibly disciplining officials where financial and electoral incentives do not apply. Yet do requirements for reason-giving induce officials to pursue statutory objectives or behave prosocially? Little observational evidence exists on this question. I study a natural experiment in federal procurement in which contracting officials were required to provide reasons if they awarded certain noncompetitive contracts but only if valued above a statutory threshold. Using a difference-in-differences design, I find that the reason-giving requirement substantially increased the probability that officials competed contracts, thus complying with the statutory objective. I also explore a discontinuity design but discover sorting around the threshold by sophisticated entities, further supporting the materiality of reason-giving. Secondary results suggest the requirement reduced the volume of contracts awarded and altered the composition of firms receiving contracts. These findings speak to the force of reason-giving requirements and their complex trade-offs.

Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/734866 (application/pdf)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/734866 (text/html)
Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ucp:jlstud:doi:10.1086/734866

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in The Journal of Legal Studies from University of Chicago Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Journals Division ().