Biased Policy Professionals

Resource type
Authors/contributors
Title
Biased Policy Professionals
Abstract
Although the decisions of policy professionals are often more consequential than those of individuals in their private capacity, there is a dearth of studies on the biases of policy professionals: those who prepare and implement policy on behalf of elected politicians. Experiments conducted on a novel subject pool of development policy professionals (public servants of the World Bank and the Department for International Development in the UK) show that policy professionals are indeed subject to decision-making traps, including the effects of framing outcomes as losses or gains, and, most strikingly, confirmation bias driven by ideological predisposition, despite having an explicit mission to promote evidence-informed and impartial decision making. These findings should worry policy professionals and their principals in governments and large organizations, as well as citizens themselves. A further experiment, in which policy professionals engage in discussion, shows that deliberation may be able to mitigate the effects of some of these biases.
Publication
The World Bank Economic Review
Volume
33
Issue
2
Pages
310-327
Date
2019/06/01
Journal Abbr
World Bank Econ Rev
Language
en
ISSN
0258-6770
Accessed
12/08/2019, 22:46
Library Catalogue
Citation
Banuri, S., Dercon, S., & Gauri, V. (2019). Biased Policy Professionals. The World Bank Economic Review, 33(2), 310–327. https://doi.org/10.1093/wber/lhy033