The Behavioral Foundations of New Economic Thinking

This paper produces an edited version of an interview conducted by Professor Eric Beinhocker, Executive Director, INET Oxford, with Professor Sanjit Dhami of the University of Leicester, author of the Foundations of Behavioral Economic Analysis (Dhami 2016), on 9th May 2019 at the University of Oxford. The questions posed by Professor Beinhocker covered a wide interdisciplinary terrain that ranged from important contributions in behavioral economics and the way forward; inertia in the economics profession to accept the new interdisciplinary research; the scientific method; the interplay of culture, behavior and institutions; the role of norms; and a critique of complexity and agent based models. We are publishing this interview as a working paper to foster debate and reflection among economists and other social scientists regarding some of the “big-picture” questions in the behavioral sciences, and to highlight the powerful role that behavioral economics can play in illuminating a deeper understanding of the economy and other social systems