The Acceptability of Accountability
Constitutional Political Economy
We run an experiment in which subjects must allocate funds to their society, and can compensate for bad luck, low effort, or both. Subjects choose liberal or compensatory principles across these two dimensions. Just a minority of subjects support liberal policies.
Abstract
This paper reports on an experimental test of the acceptability of the Principle of Accountability. This is a principle of social justice, and states, “individuals should be rewarded for factors under their control […], but not for factors outside their control” (Cappelen and Tungodden (2009)). We specifically ask for acceptability of theprinciple underlying it, rather than for particular rewards in particular instances. We carry out the test with both an Internal and an External Dictator, conducting a laboratory experiment with a total of 240 subjects. We find that there is broad, but not overwhelming support for the Principle. When the Principle is internally inconsistent no clear preference emerges, which is not surprising.