Since the pioneering works of Mc Luhan and Patino, the theme of “negligence” has become a social debate. This book has the merit of not limiting negligence to simple attention defects due in particular to the attraction of screens or algorithmic black boxes. It extends to all daily actions, professional behaviors and social attitudes. The subtitle of the book, “an economy of inattention”, betrays the ambition of the authors, which is to establish negligence as a scientific discipline.
If they pay attention, the reader of the book will discover that there are culpable, natural, rational or irrational negligence … but also, comfortable (when they save time) and desirable (when they are affected). The reader will distinguish between the negligent intellectuals, manual workers, civil servants, the credulous, the overwhelmed, the tired, the drowsy, etc. They will understand that negligence cannot be avoided in the democratic game, the management of organizations and the functioning of society, but that, in some cases, it contributes to new inventions or creations. The forms of negligence are diversified under the effects of digital platforms that practice nudge (soft influence), deploy dark patterns (internet traps) or offer too many “good deals”.
The authors do not limit themselves to practical cases, they decline the negligence of intellectuals, decision-makers, the credulous, the tired… but also of citizens and elected representatives caught up in the democratic game, thus demonstrating a penetrating sense of current events.
The book therefore deserves the attention of citizens-consumers for the originality of its subject, the relevance of its observations and the quality of its style. Perhaps it is in turn negligent in not analyzing the psychological and psychoanalytical causes of negligence, as well as in not assessing its destructive effects of value at the level of a family, a company or a country.
M. BACACHE-BEAUVALLET is a professor at ENS and Telecom Paris. F. BENHAMOU is Professor Emeritus at the University of Paris-Nord and Sciences Po Paris. She is president of the Cercle des économistes.
Jean-Jacques Pluchart