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It's cool to be car-free |
The key premise behind http://www.giveupyourcar.com/ is that you should give up your car because it will make your life better. You don't need to wait for anyone else to do anything. Just do it. Now. But politicians and policy makers can sometimes help you make the right choice. Not just with the usual sticks, but by providing better (not more) information, and maybe the occasional carrot. "Nudge" is the 2008 hot button for changing behaviour. It's the term used by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein whose book discusses how public and private organisations can help people make better choices in their daily lives. Thaler and Sunstein say that we could all use some help when making choices, as humans are prone to biases that get in the way of making the best decisions. Sometimes this is about editing the available choices differently; sometimes it means more fundamental changes to help us make better choices. Taking the piss Examples? Thaler refers to a simple etching of a fly in a men's urinal in the Netherlands which encouraged men to aim and so spill less. No signs or commands just an urge to aim at the fly by most men left the bathrooms cleaner. David Cameron, the UK's Leader of the Oppostion, put "Nudge" on the reading list for Conservative Party MPs for the 2008 summer recess, describing it as "required reading." Barack Obama has also taken an interest. We will be posting some ideas that policy makers could use to nudge people towards living a better life, without a car. The Nudge guys put one of my suggestions on their site on 21 August 2008. See: http://www.nudges.wordpress.com/ If you have any Nudge-type suggestions, please send them to the Forum pages at GiveUpYourCar.com. And if you'd like to see more examples, check these out: PlateWire is a website which acts as a public repository and electronic forum of driver behaviour. Starting around Washington DC it files comments on drivers via their license plates, in an attempt to improve driving standards and reduce the risk of accidents and road rage. Part Name & Shame, part Nudge, you can find out more by clicking on: Another Nudge, in a video that cyclists will like, is here: http://nudges.wordpress.com/watch-out-for-cyclists/ For more examples of Nudging, see http://www.nudges.org/; the Nudge blog is at http://www.nudges.wordpress.com/ Source: Thaler, Richard & Sunstein, Cass, Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness, (Yale University Press, 2008) |