‘Normative Behavioral Economics’ Revisited: Toward a Behavioral Normative Economics

A little more than a decade ago, Nathan Berg asked the question why behavioral economics had not yet inspired a reorientation of normative economics. Given the ever rising interest in the new, psychologically informed economics, the present paper will outline the way reasoning about the normative implications of behavioral economics has developed since Berg raised the issue. We argue that behavioral economics has inspired new thinking about the prospect of – what we would call – a Behavioral Normative Economics. The paper sketches important approaches in the field, questions their internal theoretical coherence, and outlines initial ideas on how to alter the notion of welfare in normative economics.