Plática:Separating Energy Policy from Energy Politics

Sep

11:30

11.30 a 13.00

OTRA

University of Texas. Austin

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You're Biased and I'm Not.
Separating Energy Policy from Energy Politics

"We will explore what the behavioral sciences have to say about why we cannot agree on what is true, let alone what is best, in energy policy debates, and how to overcome those biases.” Professor David Spence

The Texas Enterprise Speaker Series invites you to "You're Biased and I'm Not: Separating Energy Policy from Energy Politics" on Friday, September 4, with Dr. David Spence, Professor of Law, Politics & Regulation at McCombs School of Business and Professor of Law at University of Texas School of Law
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In today’s hyper-polarized regulatory policy environment, intense conflict over energy policy is a fact of life. Gone are the days when a Republican president created the EPA (Richard Nixon) or ran for office as “the environmental president” (George H.W. Bush), and a Democratic president deregulated natural gas markets (Jimmy Carter).

Today, the parties are at ideological loggerheads on questions at the intersection of energy and the environment, disagreeing not only about what is best, but also about what is true. Is climate change real and driven by human behavior? Does fracking pose significant risks to groundwater or human health? Do power lines pose health risks to those who live near them? We will explore what the behavioral sciences have to say about why we cannot agree on what is true, let alone what is best, in energy policy debates, and how to overcome those biases.
What You Will Learn

How law and politics shape the energy and environmental policy debates in the news today
How some of the centrifugal forces that polarize our politics are traceable to common cognitive biases (to which we are all vulnerable)
How those biases skew our perception of important facts at the root of the most heated and persistent energy policy disputes
How interest groups try to amplify and leverage our biases for their own purposes
How you can try to minimize your own susceptibility to these forces, and understand energy policy issues better

When  Friday, September 4, 2015 11:30AM - 1:00PM
Where  Room 202 AT&T Executive Education and Conference Center, 1900 University Avenue, Austin, TX 78705
Cost  $20, includes lunch.
Parking  AT&T Center Garage Parking and surrounding public lots.

Dr. David Spence
David Spence is Professor of Law at the University of Texas School of Law, and Professor of Law, Politics & Regulation at UT's McCombs School of Business. He earned his Ph.D. in political science from Duke University, and his J.D. from the University of North Carolina School of Law. Professor Spence's research and teaching focus on government regulation, particularly energy and environmental regulation. He is co-author of the nation's leading energy law textbook, Energy, Economics and the Environment (Foundation Press 4th Ed., 2010), and has published more than 30 scholarly articles on subjects relating to energy regulation and the regulatory process in journals such as the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, the California Law Review, the Cornell Law Review, the Texas Law Review, and the Journal of Legal Studies, among others.

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