行为市场失灵及其法律应对

Behavioral Market Failure and Its Legal Response

半个世纪以来,人类的认知偏差被不断发现和验证,理论成果被经营者大量应用于市场营销。利用认知偏差进行市场营销并不违反现有法律关于消费者知情权、自主交易权等规定,但它损害消费者利益于无形之中,在宏观上还会改变正常的市场竞争模式和交易模式,导致不当的资源配置,从而形成行为市场失灵。在影响消费者决策的层次、信息呈现的方式以及损害结果的隐蔽程度等方面,行为市场失灵与传统市场失灵完全不同,从而对传统规制理论构成了挑战,也在经济法相关制度方面形成了新的立法需求。认知偏差是人类的适应性进化,在应对行为市场失灵的过程中,需要基于这一事实判断,超越传统规制方式和规制方案,形成新的规制理念和规制路径,在信息工具的使用、特定营销情形的限制或禁止以及消费教育的开展等方面,构建应对行为市场失灵的经济法体系。

Human cognitive bias has been continuously discovered and verified for half a century, and the theory has been widely used in marketing. Though the use of cognitive bias in marketing does not infringe consumers’ right to know and independent trading right according to existing legal provisions, it is not only damaging consumers’ interests invisibly, but also changing the normal market competition mode and trading practices, resulting in promoting the improper allocation of resources and behavioral market failure. In terms of the level of influence on consumer decision-making, the way of information presentation and the degree of concealment of damage results, behavioral market failure is completely different from traditional market failure, which brings challenges to the traditional regulatory theory and raises new legislative requirements for the economic law. In the process of coping with behavioral market failure, we shall bear in mind that judgements are based on cognitive bias, which is an adaptive evolution of human beings. Forming new regulatory concepts and regulation paths beyond the traditional methods and schemes is unavoidable. To effectively deal with behavioral market failure, an economic legal system with the use of information tools, the restriction or prohibition of specific marketing practices, and the promotion of consumer education should be established.