Why do policies and business practices that ignore the moral and generous side of human nature often fail? Should the idea of economic man—the amoral and self-interested Homo economicus—determine how we expect people to respond to monetary rewards, punishments, and other incentives? Samuel...

Treating civic preferences as endogenous and government policies and tax capacities as both an influence on and a consequence of their evolution is an important new strand of thinking to which Besley has contributed. I ask: Does his model provide a convincing explanation of the way that civic...