Podcast appearances and mentions of lynn stout

In this episode, Rayne and Mika chat with Nick Townsend. Nick is an academic and theologian from England who specialises in Christian politics and ethics. The conversation covers the history of individualism in the West, Catholic Social Teaching and Christian ethics, and conceptualisations of the common good. Nick outlines the role of businesses, workers, governments, and citizens in forming and contributing to the common good, in order to build a society where everyone can flourish.ReferencesLaborem Exercens (1981) | John Paul IICCLA – common-good focused investment bankTogether For The Common Good (UK charity)Charles Taylor, Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity (1989)Lynn Stout, The Shareholder Value Myth: How Putting Shareholders First Harms Investors, Corporations, and the Public (2004)Nicholas Townsend, 'Blue Labour + Red Tory = Christian Democracy?' (2015)

Jamie joined Traditional Medicinals in 2019 as the Chief Purpose Officer. She manages Traditional Medicinals sustainability efforts including risk assessment, Zero Waste Project, regenerative and carbon strategy, and supply chain data management. Jamie is a recognized leader with expertise in corporate responsibility, sustainability, shared value creation and employee and community engagement. In January 2022, Jamie's role officially expanded to include the Human Resources team. Previously, Jamie was the Senior Director of Corporate Responsibility at McKesson, a Fortune 6 healthcare company. Prior to that she was the Senior Director, Employee Engagement and Corporate Responsibility at Visa and served as the Director of Community Engagement at the Alcoa Foundation for 10 years. Jamie earned a MS, Leadership for Sustainability, from University of Vermont, an Executive Certificate in Strategic Reputation Management from Dartmouth College, and MBA, Strategic Management, Organization Behavior from The University of British Columbia and a BS in Business Administration, IT, Finance and Accounting from Duquesne University. Jamie Joins Sustainable Nation to Discuss: How the B Corp community has helped Traditional Medicinals advance its sustainability efforts The FairWild Certification Transitioning to biodegradable packaging Challenges and processes for quantifying scope 3 emissions Advice and recommendations for sustainability professionals Jamie's Final Five Questions Responses: What is one piece of advice you would give other sustainability professionals that might help them in their careers?  Understanding communication skills and influence skills really matter. What I found, especially working in large companies, is that most leaders are not ill-intentioned, but they may be preoccupied and they may be out of their depth on some of these sustainability topics. So the more you can meet them where they are, think about the scope of responsibility they have as well as their personal values and the company values, and then help move them in the direction of the change that you want to see, the easier it will be for everyone.  What are you most excited about right now in the world of sustainability?  This might be specific to me, but I think we're probably seeing it across the board as hiring managers, is that environmental courses and topics are much more prevalent today than they were when we were in school. What I find now is that many people have degrees or minors in environmental sustainability. They may be working in marketing or R&D or procurement, but they have a real passion for environmental sustainability. We used to have to convince people, we had to do a lot of selling internally to get our initiatives bumped to the top of the priority list. Now we have ready allies across the organization who are really agitating for change. I think that's great, but it does require us as sustainability leaders to change our skills from leading from the front to coordinating and collaborating across departments. But I'm excited to see how many people have skill and passion.  What is one book you'd recommend sustainability leaders read?  I love The Shareholder Value Myth by Lynn Stout. We can't talk about the future health of the planet without talking about the way that our capital markets work. There's a real case to be made for long-term thinking, and I think she does a really good job discussing that.  What are some of your favorite resources or tools that really help you in your work?  The Fair Wild Foundation. If you care about conservation or plants, it's a great one to learn from. They produce really great, thought leadership pieces. For those in the food industry, we use a tool called HowGood that allows us to understand the environmental footprint and impact of our products. That helps us when we're innovating as well. We want to deliver specific impact to our consumers, but if we can do that in a lower environmentally impactful way, that's great. So HowGood is another great tool. Where can our listeners go to learn more about you and the work being done at Traditional Medicinals? Our website is https://www.traditionalmedicinals.com/. If you go to the impact section, you can find our impact report. You can find lots of stories about what we're doing in the world and our approach to business, and I hope you enjoy it. I think it's a beautiful site. It also teaches a lot about plants.

How can we manage the ethical challenges faced in business?On this special episode of the show, I'm speaking to Professor Josephine Nelson, the co-author of a brand new book called ‘Business Ethics: What Everyone Needs To Know'. Josephine — who publishes as JS Nelson — is a Professor of Business Ethics (Law) at Villanova Law School and is currently a visiting professor at Harvard business school. The episode is special because I'm releasing it just a few days after recording as an extra episode between the regular schedule. That usually only happens when I've recorded an episode about something topical in the news. Ethics is something I've covered before (links to relevant episodes below). The reason I'm rushing this episode out is personal. Not because I have to resolve many ethical issues in my business — though, as you'll hear, we all have to deal with them on an ongoing basis and if you think you don't, watch out! Instead, because of the considerable number of times I've found myself talking about the ideas shared by my guest since recording. The insights provided by Josephine have come up so many times, in such a short period, that I wanted to get the episode out asap. In part, so the clients I've already spoken to about them — and those I undoubtedly will — can hear it directly from her. That hopefully also means it's highly relevant to you. Josephine's insights in the book and on the show aren't just relevant to our work environments. They can also help us to think about the decisions made by companies we engage with — or choose not to — politicians we vote for - or don't — and those with whom we surround ourselves — or don't.The episode contains some very simple observations about ethics. But don't let the simplicity fool you. They're astonishingly insightful and practical. I can't recommend the book enough, and I'm really excited to bring you this episode because what Josephine has to say is incredibly important. And if you think that means an overly serious episode, think again. As you'll hear, Josephine is a lot of fun, and there's lots of laughter.To find out more about Josephine's work at Harvard Business School - https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/profile.aspx?facId=876714To learn more about the book she co-authored with Lynn Stout, “Business Ethics: What Everyone Needs to Know” and to explore her areas of research, visit Josephine's website - https://www.jsnelson.net/During our discussion, we talk aboutJosephine's previous appearance on the show, a cross cast of Alison Taylor & Jerome Tagger's Breaking The Fever Podcast on Workplace Surveillance: https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/professor-j-s-nelson-on/Professor Yuval Feldman's work on writing rules for ‘Good People' - https://www.law.nyu.edu/sites/default/files/upload_documents/Feldman%20The%20Law%20of%20Good%20People.pdfThe Boeing 737 Max Scandal - https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/cold-call-what-went-wrong-with-the-boeing-737-maxThe Wells Fargo Cross-Selling Scandal - https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2019/02/06/the-wells-fargo-cross-selling-scandal-2/The Wells Fargo Fake Account Scandal - https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2020/02/21/business/wells-fargo-settlement.amp.htmlThe Volkswagen Diesel Scandal - https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-34324772.ampThe Johnson Johnson Baby Powder Scandal - https://www.forbes.com/sites/korihale/2022/03/02/johnson--johnson-attempts-to-side-step-100-million-baby-powder-settlement/Her co-author Lynn Stout — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynn_A._StoutMary Gentile's system called ‘Giving voice to Values' which Josephine describes as “how to speak truth to power, without getting fired” — https://givingvoicetovaluesthebook.com/‘Ethics Unwrapped' from the McComb School of Business at the University of Texas — https://ethicsunwrapped.utexas.edu/How Swiss Bank Credit Suisse tried to track down a whistleblower — https://www.finextra.com/newsarticle/39731/credit-suisse-calls-in-expert-help-to-hunt-down-whistleblowerSome of the other ethics-related episodes of the show:Ruth Steinholtz on Ethical Cultures - https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/ruth-steinholtz-on-ethical-cultures/Dr Sarah Eaton on Ethics in Academia - https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/dr-sarah-eaton-on-ethics/Dr Todd Haugh on the Behavioural Aspects of Ethics & Compliance - https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/dr-todd-haugh-on-the/Rob Chestnut on how companies can help their employees to work with integrity - https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/rob-chesnut-on-how-companies/Rabbi Yonason Goldson on a Rabbi's View of Ethics -https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/rabbi-yonason-goldson-on-a/Maarten Hoekstra on Ethics: ‘making the good doable' -https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/maarten-hoekstra-on-ethics-making/

Intro.(1:37) - Start of interview(2:19) - Jon's "origin story." He started as a sports journalist, later became press secretary to then NYC Comptroller Jay Goldin. His transition to asset management, founding his firm Sinclair Capital and leading the Investor Responsibility Research Center Institute (IRRCi) (succeeded by the Weinberg Center) focused on ESG and capital market issues.(4:48) - His experience with the NYC pension funds, CII and how he addresses the different "stages of governance" described in his book "Moving Beyond Modern Portfolio Theory: Investing That Matters." His historical perspective on corporate governance from the Dutch East India Company (1602). HBS Professors Myles Mace: "Boards are ornaments on a corporate Christmas tree" and Peter Drucker: "The one thing that all boards have in common is that they do not work." His experience with Creditors Committee at WorldCom. Corporate governance in the 1980s changed for two reasons:In a capitalist society whoever has capital, has power. By the 1980s, institutional investors became very influential with more assets under management.This was prompted in part by the greenmail scandals. In one year (1983-1984) this practice extracted $4bn from US corporationsThat prompted the formation of the Council of Institutional Investors (1985).(13:04) -  The disagreement is not over corporate governance, but rather over "optimal" corporate governance. This is so because capital is changing. "75%-94% of your returns is due to the systematic nature of the markets." The problem with MPT.(17:41) - The concept of "Beta Activism"(19:54) - The focus of his book "Moving Beyond MPT": "This is not a modest book: we are trying to redefine what investing is." "Stewardship for the benefit of the marketplace as a whole, to deal with systematic risk issues that  that we can't deal with mere diversification." More holistic and long term vision of how to improve the risk return of the market as a whole.(21:41) - Shareholder activism on ESG and sustainability ("Beta Activism"). Examples: Engine No.1 on Exxon, Climate Change. "There will also be changes on how shareholder resolutions will be crafted." For example: Yum Brands  on the systemic effects of the use of antibiotics in its supply chain by the end of 2021 (proposed by Paul Rissman and the Shareholder Commons). From individual companies to global/industry levels. Another example, new safety standards after the Vale scandals. "The problem is that somehow in the 1990s/2000s the shareholders figured out how to be first and last in the line."(26:16) - Debate on corporate purpose (shareholder primacy / stakeholder capitalism / benefit corporations). "I think the person who jumpstarted this discussion was Lynn Stout with her book the shareholder value myth." "You have to care about how companies are dealing with the health of the system as a whole." "But I still think that the governance of a company needs a final decision: that's the shareholders [on how to maximize the residual benefit but taking care of everyone else to do that." "I've always thought it was a false dichotomy [to think about shareholder primacy vs stakeholder capitalism.]" Alex Edman's book "Grow the Pie": shareholder value as a subset of societal value. Shareholders are at the back of the line.(30:30) - His perspective on international corporate governance trends. Cross-influence between the US and Europe. Asia. Taking into accounts culture. The last US administration tampered down ESG in the last 4 years.(35:29) - His take on public vs private companies (Wall Street vs Silicon Valley). The advent of dual class shares in Silicon Valley: "founder syndrome." There are different risk desires and appetites for smaller growth companies vs larger mature companies.(39:43) - His thoughts on western vs authoritarian vs the next dominant economic paradigm. "Confucian curse of living through interesting times."(43:15) - His favorite book: Fifth Business, by Robertson Davies (1970)(43:41) - His favorite play: As You Like It, by William Shakespeare(45:45) - His mentors:His sister (personal)Jay Goldin (professional)(47:38) - His favorite quote: "It's better to be approximately right than precisely wrong" and "Work hard and be nice to people" (new Michael Franti song)(48:30) - His "unusual habit": He loves to cook.(49:26) - The living person he most admires: his wife.(49:56) - His views on the future of NY post pandemic.Jon Lukomnik is the Founder of Sinclair Capital. Jon chairs the audit committee of the Van Eck mutual funds, is a core member of the Funston Advisory team, and serves on the Deloitte Audit Quality Advisory Committee. He has a long track record in corporate governance having served as an investment advisor for the New York City’s pension funds, a managing director of a top ten hedge fund and a director for public and private companies, non-profit corporations and litigation trusts. His new book, co-authored with Professor James Hawley, is “Moving Beyond Modern Portfolio Theory: Investing That Matters”. If you like this show, please consider subscribing, leaving a review or sharing this podcast on social media. __Follow Evan on:Twitter @evanepsteinSubstack https://evanepstein.substack.com/Music/Soundtrack (found via Free Music Archive): Seeing The Future by Dexter Britain is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License

Professor Lynn stout was a professor at Cornell Law School, where she was an internationally recognized expert in the field of corporate governance, securities, regulation, financial derivatives, law and economics. Lynn discussed her book, Shareholder Value Myth. Recorded in 2015 Lynn shares with me more of the insights from her book. This book is short and easy to get through, but packed with a very clear perspective and some great insights.“And each of the 50 states has a corporate code, including Delaware, which is the most important state for corporate law since the majority of Fortune 500 companies are incorporated there.” - Lynn StoutToday on Startups for Good we cover:Lynn's background and how she got her start in business and corporate law.She shares with us how she came to realize that a company's responsibility to increase shareholder value is a myth and what that has translated in long range returns.She shares how this way of thinking has impacted other people within the corporation especially the employees.Directors and officers of corporation have no general legal duty to maximize shareholder valueShe explains the business judgement rule and how it affects how the directors are held responsible.Here are the links to the articles that Miles referenced in the episode:https://www.businessroundtable.org/business-roundtable-redefines-the-purpose-of-a-corporation-to-promote-an-economy-that-serves-all-americanshttps://www.nytimes.com/1970/09/13/archives/a-friedman-doctrine-the-social-responsibility-of-business-is-to.htmlSubscribe, Rate & Share Your Favorite Episodes!Thanks for tuning into today's episode of Startups For Good with your host, Miles Lasater. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a rating and review on your favorite podcast listening app.Don't forget to visit our website, follow Miles on LinkedIn, follow us on Twitter or Instagram, and share your favorite episodes across social media.For more information or to join The Giving Circle visit: www.startupsforgood.com and click on Giving Circle.

Start of interview [1:38]Rick's "origin story" [1:55]His "traditional" corporate law practice for 25 years with Morris Nichols in Delaware ("the core of our advice followed two simple rules: shareholders get to elect the directors, and directors run the company for the benefit of those shareholders... all the rest is commentary") [3:45]How his focus changed in 2010 with B Lab's effort to push legislation in DE on benefit corporations [5:45]How B Lab's benefit corporations proposal differed from "constituency statutes" [07:50]Three sets of cases worth thinking about: 1) Pre-constituency statutes (shareholder primacy); 2) Constituency statutes ("it's a may, not a shall"); 3) Benefit corporations (only one case has been filed, in Virginia, and it quickly settled)  [10:41]The first benefit corporation statute was enacted in Maryland in 2010 [12:59]B Lab's push in Delaware, and how Rick joined B Lab. Some influence from Lynn Stout's "The Shareholder Value Myth."  [13:50]Although originally shunned by VCs, public benefit corporations incorporated in Delaware have raised ~$2.5bn between 2013 and 2019 per a recent study (based on 275 early-stage financings). Per Rick, total US fundraising by benefit corporations is in the order of $4 billion. [15:54]Evolution of legal structures for benefit corporations, expanding the BJR: B Lab's proposed MBCL, PBCs in Delaware, ABA version, British Columbia, etc.) [17:55]Accounting for social value "what gets measured, gets managed": SASB (sustainability metrics), GRI Standards, B Impact Assessment (score and certification). Pressure on the SEC and EU's metrics [26:16]Distinguishing benefit corporations (generic term, ~10,000 companies around the world), public benefit corporations (Delaware form, ~2,000 companies) and B-corps (certification by B Lab, ~3,500 internationally, of which only ~300 are benefit corporations). Danone's conversion to "Entreprise à Mission." [29:57]Traditional VC investors are investing in benefit corporations (not only impact investors) [34:20]Benefit corporations in public markets (3 IPOs, 3 conversions): Laureate Education (2017), Lemonade (2020), Vital Farms (2020). Brazil's Natura (certified B Corp) acquisition of Avon (2019), Danone and Amalgamated Bank  [36:22]How does Rick respond to criticism of the benefit corporation model and the need to get support from institutional investors to succeed [40:43]How to reconcile the current debate of the purpose of the corporation, plus ESG trends, with the benefit corporation movement [45:51]The focus of Rick's new project The Shareholder Commons (2019), with initial funding from the Ford Foundation. "We want to change the paradigm for institutional investors (through advocacy, guardrails, policy and litigation)" [50:03]His book "Benefit Corporation Law & Governance: Pursuing Profit with Purpose." (2017) [56:41]His favorite books: [58:36]The Mind's I (Douglas Hofstadter and Daniel C. Dennett)Wherever You Go, There You Are (Jon Kabat-Zinn)Morality, Competition and the Firm (Joseph Heath)His mentors: [01:01:07]John Johnston (Former partner at Morris Nichols)Lewis Black (Former partner at Morris Nichols)His favorite quote: [1:02:54]"No effort is wasted""Strategy is what you don't do"Music/Soundtrack (found via Free Music Archive): Seeing The Future by Dexter Britain is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License 

Daniel Ellsberg. Edward Snowden. Elin Baklid-Kunz. Lynn Stout. Diane Roark. Franz Gayl. They and others like them come from all across the country. Some worked for the federal government; others worked in the private sector. All have one thing in common: in the organizations for which they worked, they saw things they knew were morally and legally wrong. Each made a life-altering decision to do something about it.In his new book, Crisis of Conscience: Whistleblowing in an Age of Fraud, journalist Tom Mueller takes us into the world of the whistleblower. What makes them different? Why did they elect to act when others would not? Do the pathologies in large organizations — whether in government or the private sector — inevitably produce whistleblowers? Is Congress serious about protecting whistleblowers? How do protections for federal whistleblowers differ from agency to agency and from the private sector? Are new federal “insider threat” programs just a bureaucrat smokescreen for cracking down on internal dissent?Join us as an expert panel talks with Mueller about his book and the state of government and corporate whistleblowing in the Trump era. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Business law expert Lynn Stout (Cornell)argues that legal justification exists for corporations to include environmental and social sustainability in business decisions. Her legal analysis challenges the myth that creating profits for shareholders is the most important responsibility of a corporation. Stout details how focussing on shareholder profits can lead to environmental damage, social injustice and inequitable governance. Learn more: http://go.uvm.edu/etusf

Phalana Tiller talks with participants of the recent Drucker Institute Forum on Long-Termism. Guests include: Lynn Stout of Cornell University, Jason Voss of the CFA Institute, Jack Bergstrand of Brand Velocity, Bill Densmore of the Rules Change Project, Miguel Padró of the Aspen Institute, Roger Martin of the University of Toronto, Rick Wartzman of the Drucker Institute and Michael Kleeman of the University of California at San Diego and the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board.

Lynn Stout joins Jay Ackroyd to discuss her book, The Shareholder Value Myth. The idea that a public corporation has one, and only objective--to maximize shareholder value is such a widely held idea that it's deeply implicit in much current business writing. What else is a corporation to do, but to maximize shareholder value? More at virtuallyspeaking.us

Lynn Stout‘s pathbreaking book Cultivating Conscience:How Good Laws Make Good People (Princeton University Press, 2010) represents a much-needed update to the discipline of law and economics. Using current social science and discarding threadbare premises, it develops new methods for theorizing and deploying law in its real-life context — starting from the simple observation that, as a matter of scientific fact, people are often remarkably and demonstrably unselfish. In updating her own field of study, Prof. Stout found herself, unexpectedly, calling into question one of its most cherished axioms. Scholars of law and economics had always begun with the assumption that people were “rationally selfish.” Cass Sunstein’s 2008 book Nudge called into question the first term of that formula; Prof. Stout, holder of an endowed chair in Corporate and Securities Law at UCLA, now challenges the second.On the evidence of this book, it seems more than possible that her insights will prove more significant in the long run. Lucidly summarizing the vast quantities of recent social-science research on so-called prosocial behavior, Cultivating Conscience shows how selfishness is overhyped as a driver of human conduct.Prof. Stout finds repeatedly that when there is a gap between actual legal structures and current legal theory, the problems are not with the law, but with the theory — problems rooted in certain academic cultures, unscientific thinking, and inattention to the empirically proven power of human conscience. The prospect of correcting these errors suggests a new direction for the field of law and economics. Conscience may turn out to be a policy tool as useful as incentivization. In fact, the power of Prof. Stout’s analytic framework, both as description and prescription, may make one-dimensional evaluation of legal incentives obsolete. Using the method proposed here, policymakers attentive to the key parameters of authority, conformity, and empathy may develop ways to “cue” conscientious behavior in a wide variety of social contexts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lynn Stout‘s pathbreaking book Cultivating Conscience:How Good Laws Make Good People (Princeton University Press, 2010) represents a much-needed update to the discipline of law and economics. Using current social science and discarding threadbare premises, it develops new methods for theorizing and deploying law in its real-life context — starting from the simple observation that, as a matter of scientific fact, people are often remarkably and demonstrably unselfish. In updating her own field of study, Prof. Stout found herself, unexpectedly, calling into question one of its most cherished axioms. Scholars of law and economics had always begun with the assumption that people were “rationally selfish.” Cass Sunstein’s 2008 book Nudge called into question the first term of that formula; Prof. Stout, holder of an endowed chair in Corporate and Securities Law at UCLA, now challenges the second.On the evidence of this book, it seems more than possible that her insights will prove more significant in the long run. Lucidly summarizing the vast quantities of recent social-science research on so-called prosocial behavior, Cultivating Conscience shows how selfishness is overhyped as a driver of human conduct.Prof. Stout finds repeatedly that when there is a gap between actual legal structures and current legal theory, the problems are not with the law, but with the theory — problems rooted in certain academic cultures, unscientific thinking, and inattention to the empirically proven power of human conscience. The prospect of correcting these errors suggests a new direction for the field of law and economics. Conscience may turn out to be a policy tool as useful as incentivization. In fact, the power of Prof. Stout’s analytic framework, both as description and prescription, may make one-dimensional evaluation of legal incentives obsolete. Using the method proposed here, policymakers attentive to the key parameters of authority, conformity, and empathy may develop ways to “cue” conscientious behavior in a wide variety of social contexts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lynn Stout‘s pathbreaking book Cultivating Conscience:How Good Laws Make Good People (Princeton University Press, 2010) represents a much-needed update to the discipline of law and economics. Using current social science and discarding threadbare premises, it develops new methods for theorizing and deploying law in its real-life context — starting from the simple observation that, as a matter of scientific fact, people are often remarkably and demonstrably unselfish. In updating her own field of study, Prof. Stout found herself, unexpectedly, calling into question one of its most cherished axioms. Scholars of law and economics had always begun with the assumption that people were “rationally selfish.” Cass Sunstein’s 2008 book Nudge called into question the first term of that formula; Prof. Stout, holder of an endowed chair in Corporate and Securities Law at UCLA, now challenges the second.On the evidence of this book, it seems more than possible that her insights will prove more significant in the long run. Lucidly summarizing the vast quantities of recent social-science research on so-called prosocial behavior, Cultivating Conscience shows how selfishness is overhyped as a driver of human conduct.Prof. Stout finds repeatedly that when there is a gap between actual legal structures and current legal theory, the problems are not with the law, but with the theory — problems rooted in certain academic cultures, unscientific thinking, and inattention to the empirically proven power of human conscience. The prospect of correcting these errors suggests a new direction for the field of law and economics. Conscience may turn out to be a policy tool as useful as incentivization. In fact, the power of Prof. Stout’s analytic framework, both as description and prescription, may make one-dimensional evaluation of legal incentives obsolete. Using the method proposed here, policymakers attentive to the key parameters of authority, conformity, and empathy may develop ways to “cue” conscientious behavior in a wide variety of social contexts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lynn Stout‘s pathbreaking book Cultivating Conscience:How Good Laws Make Good People (Princeton University Press, 2010) represents a much-needed update to the discipline of law and economics. Using current social science and discarding threadbare premises, it develops new methods for theorizing and deploying law in its real-life context — starting from the simple observation that, as a matter of scientific fact, people are often remarkably and demonstrably unselfish. In updating her own field of study, Prof. Stout found herself, unexpectedly, calling into question one of its most cherished axioms. Scholars of law and economics had always begun with the assumption that people were “rationally selfish.” Cass Sunstein’s 2008 book Nudge called into question the first term of that formula; Prof. Stout, holder of an endowed chair in Corporate and Securities Law at UCLA, now challenges the second.On the evidence of this book, it seems more than possible that her insights will prove more significant in the long run. Lucidly summarizing the vast quantities of recent social-science research on so-called prosocial behavior, Cultivating Conscience shows how selfishness is overhyped as a driver of human conduct.Prof. Stout finds repeatedly that when there is a gap between actual legal structures and current legal theory, the problems are not with the law, but with the theory — problems rooted in certain academic cultures, unscientific thinking, and inattention to the empirically proven power of human conscience. The prospect of correcting these errors suggests a new direction for the field of law and economics. Conscience may turn out to be a policy tool as useful as incentivization. In fact, the power of Prof. Stout’s analytic framework, both as description and prescription, may make one-dimensional evaluation of legal incentives obsolete. Using the method proposed here, policymakers attentive to the key parameters of authority, conformity, and empathy may develop ways to “cue” conscientious behavior in a wide variety of social contexts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Lynn Stout‘s pathbreaking book Cultivating Conscience:How Good Laws Make Good People (Princeton University Press, 2010) represents a much-needed update to the discipline of law and economics. Using current social science and discarding threadbare premises, it develops new methods for theorizing and deploying law in its real-life context — starting from the...