We provide experimental evidence that subjects blame others for events they are not responsible for. An agent chooses between a lottery and a safe asset for a principal who then decides how much to allocate between the agent and a third party. We observe widespread blame: agents are blamed by principals for the outcome of the lottery, an event they are not responsible for. We provide an explanation of this apparently irrational behavior with a delegated-expertise principal-agent model, the subjects’ salient perturbation of the environment. By guaranteeing individual accountability, blame can be rationalized as part of a normative morality.
Why Blame?
MILLER, JOSHUA BENJAMIN;
2013
Abstract
We provide experimental evidence that subjects blame others for events they are not responsible for. An agent chooses between a lottery and a safe asset for a principal who then decides how much to allocate between the agent and a third party. We observe widespread blame: agents are blamed by principals for the outcome of the lottery, an event they are not responsible for. We provide an explanation of this apparently irrational behavior with a delegated-expertise principal-agent model, the subjects’ salient perturbation of the environment. By guaranteeing individual accountability, blame can be rationalized as part of a normative morality.
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