Behavioral Economics and Nuclear Weapons

Recent discoveries in psychology and neuroscience have improved our understanding of why decision-making processes fail to match standard social science assumptions about rationality. Behavioral economics provides a more accurate picture of how people think and make decisions about nuclear weapons policy, which is made in real-world circumstances in which rational calculations about cost and benefit are intertwined with emotions and subject to human limitations. Strategies for pursuing nuclear deterrence and nonproliferation should account for these dynamics in a systematic way.

Format: Hardback
Length: 216 pages
Publication date: 30 July 2019
Publisher: University of Georgia Press

Recent breakthroughs in psychology and neuroscience have significantly enhanced our comprehension of why our decision-making processes deviate from standard social science assumptions regarding rationality. As researchers like Daniel Kahneman, Amos Tversky, and Richard Thaler have demonstrated, individuals frequently deviate systematically from the predictions of the rational actor model of classical economic thought due to the influence of emotions, cognitive biases, aversion to loss, and other powerful motivations and values. These findings about the boundaries of rationality have formed the foundation of behavioral economics, a field that has garnered immense attention in recent years.

This collection of essays applies the insights of behavioral economics to the study of nuclear weapons policy. Behavioral economics provides us with a more accurate portrayal of how people think and, consequently, how they make decisions about whether to acquire or use nuclear arms. Such decisions are made in real-world contexts where rational calculations about cost and benefit are intertwined with complex emotions and subject to human limitations. Strategies for pursuing nuclear deterrence and nonproliferation should, therefore, argue the contributors, account for these dynamics in a systematic way.

The contributors to this collection examine how a behavioral approach might inform our understanding of topics such as deterrence, economic sanctions, the nuclear nonproliferation regime, and U.S. domestic debates about ballistic missile defense. The essays also take note of the limitations of a behavioral approach for dealing with situations in which even a single deviation from the predictions of any model can have dire consequences.

Weight: 506g
Dimension: 225 x 155 x 21 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780820355634