Behavioural Science, Randomized Evaluations and the Transformation of Public Policy: The Case of the UK Government

This paper sets out the political and organisational context for the adoption of behaviour change polices, noting how nudge ideas take their place within the standard operating procedures of bureaucracies and in the public arena of debate and advocacy. It suggests that accounts of the emergence of psychological governance need to take account of the way the diffusion of new ideas takes place in a political and public context.