**Registration is required for this event on Eventbrite: https://bit.ly/2H0x7Bw.

'How Far to Nudge?' is about the diffusion of behavioural public policies across the world, which governments have introduced to improve policy outcomes. Policy-makers increasingly deploy psychological insights to design light-touch measures or nudges that are along the grain of their cognitions and appeal to their good natures.

In this book, Peter John reviews why governments need to address citizens' behaviours, conveying the origins of behavioural economics and explaining how its ideas become translated into public policies. He traces the emergence of nudge units, and gives examples of the kinds of initiatives policy-makers have introduced, such as on organ donation and improving tax collection.

The many criticisms of nudge are reviewed and ethical questions are also addressed. Peter John makes the case for a more radical version of nudge, nudge plus, that takes into account the capacity for individual reflection, and which can be used by any group or citizen, even to nudge the nudgers. Click here to visit Professor Peter John’s blog post.

Professor Peter John from the Department of Political Economy will launch his new book 'How Far to Nudge?'. Please review the PDF invitation here.

Schedule: The book lauch will consist of a panel discussion and reception with drinks and nibbles.

• Panel discussion (18.00 - 19.00)
• Reception (19.00 - 20.00)

Chair: Professor Mark Pennington

Introduction: Professor Peter John

Panelists:

• Dr David Halpern, CEO of BIT
• Professor Helen Margetts
• Lord Gus O’Donnell

*Please note that the Bush House North-East Wing is located opposite NatWest and adjacent to the Bush House Centre Block.

David Halpern is the Chief Executive of the Behavioural Insights Team and Board Director. He has led the team since its inception in 2010. Prior to that, David was the founding Director of the Institute for Government and between 2001 and 2007 was the Chief Analyst at the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit. David was also appointed as the What Works National Advisor in July 2013. He supports the What Works Network and leads efforts to improve the use of evidence across government. Before entering government, David held tenure at Cambridge and posts at Oxford and Harvard. He has written several books and papers on areas relating to behavioural insights and wellbeing, including Social Capital (2005), the Hidden Wealth of Nations (2010), Inside the Nudge Unit (2015) and is co-author of the MINDSPACE report.

Helen Margetts is Professor of Society and the Internet and Director of the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford. She is a political scientist specialising in digital governance and politics, investigating political behaviour and institutions in the age of the internet, social media and data science. She has published over a hundred books, articles and policy reports in this area, including the recent book Political Turbulence: How Social Media Shape Collective Action (Princeton University Press), the Political Studies Association award for best politics book of 2017. She is a fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences, Editor-in-Chief of Policy and Internet, a Turing Fellow of the Alan Turing Institute for Data Science and a member of the UK government's Digital Economy Council. Professor Margetts joined Oxford in 2004 from University College London where she was UCL's first Professor in Political Science and Director of the School of Public Policy. She has a BSc in Mathematics (Bristol), and an MSc in Politics & PhD in Government (LSE).

Lord Gus O'Donnell is Chairman of Frontier Economics, Strategic Advisor to TD Bank, Executive Director and Strategic Advisor to Brookfield Asset Management, Chair of PwC’s Public Interest Body (PIB), President of the Council of the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), Chair of the Board of Trustees for Pro Bono Economics, Visiting Professor at LSE and UCL, a member of the Economist Trust, and Chair of the Behavioural Insights Team Advisory Board at the Cabinet Office. Gus was Cabinet Secretary and Head of the British Civil Service from 2005-2011. In 2010, he oversaw the introduction of the first coalition government since the Second World War. Previously, he was Permanent Secretary of the Treasury from 2002-2005 and served on the IMF and World Bank Boards. Gus studied Economics at Warwick University and Nuffield College, Oxford, then lectured at Glasgow University. Knighted in 2005, Gus was appointed to the House of Lords in 2012, sitting as a crossbencher (i.e. not affiliated to any political party). Gus is an Honorary Fellow of the British Academy and Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences.