Extremism
AEI Center for Regulatory and Market Studies' 2007 Distinguished Lecture

Cass R. Sunstein, professor of law at the University of Chicago Law School, will deliver the first Distinguished Lecture of the new AEI Center for Regulatory and Market Studies. His subject will be the sources of extremism. He uses recent studies of juries, federal judges, and ordinary citizens to show that groups of like-minded people often move to extreme positions on many questions, including climate change, labor policy, same-sex relations, and affirmative action. This general phenomenon--ideological amplification--helps to explain many things, including punitive damage awards, excessive and insufficient regulation, oppositional movements, political correctness, ethnic conflict, and even terrorism. He will also discuss how cost-benefit analysis, for example, can be used to solve such behavior.

About the Author

 

Christopher
DeMuth
  • Christopher DeMuth was president of AEI from December 1986 through December 2008. Previously, he was administrator for information and regulatory affairs in the Office of Management and Budget and executive director of the Presidential Task Force on Regulatory Relief in the Reagan administration; taught economics, law, and regulatory policy at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University; practiced regulatory, antitrust, and general corporate law; and worked on urban and environmental policy in the Nixon White House.

     

  • Phone: 2028625895
    Email: cdemuth@aei.org
  • Assistant Info

    Name: Keriann Hopkins
    Phone: 2028625897
    Email: keriann.hopkins@aei.org
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