Interventions in the political geography of ‘libertarian paternalism’

Reframing obesity: a critical discourse analysis of the UK’s first social marketing campaign

“…However, equally significant causal factors, like longer working hours, poor urban planning, uneven public transport infrastructure, class-based ghettos in the built environment (Pykett et al, 2011;Whitehead et al, 2012), inadequate regulation of food and drinks manufacture, marketing, and retail, are notably absent from the map. Such factors are particularly important given the fact that the report also demonstrates that obesity prevalence in the UK shows marked correlations with (lower) social class, and that comparisons of populations internationally suggest that obesity prevalence can be an outcome of increasing social inequality.…”

Geographies and politics of localism: The localism of the United Kingdom's coalition government

“…Local government funding has been cut quite enough that Local Authorities and other local actors may be desperate for the additional funding on offer through various bonus and compensation schemes. Such provision of choice that is subsequently circumscribed by manipulating contexts will be familiar to those acquainted with recent libertarian/soft paternalist approaches to policy areas from personal debt to obesity and climate change (see Jones et al 2010, Pykett et al 2011. It will be interesting to see how long the Coalition Government persists with government through liberal technologies, even libertarian paternalist technologies, if local actors continue to act 'irresponsibly' -raising local taxes, resisting local development, rationing household waste collections, and so on.…”

Why We Should Reject ‘Nudge’

“…The aim of this article, therefore, is to sketch out some preliminary answers to the above questions – questions that have not been properly addressed hitherto by the current literature on nudging. Despite the growing literature on nudge and libertarian paternalism (Jones, Pykett and Whitehead, 2011; Pykett et al., 2011), and although there has been some attempt recently to discuss nudge from a conceptual viewpoint (Hausman and Welch, 2010; John, Smith and Stoker, 2009), an attempt to address these specific questions is, by and large, distinctly absent from the current debate. Furthermore, the overt manner in which the current administration has sought to deploy nudge tactics, coupled to the questions this raises when considered in conjunction with its commitment to empowerment, freedom and fairness, does provide a specific focus for an important critique 2…”