Widespread protests around the world, including in India, are threatening economies.

“There are protests around the world that have now come to India as well and everywhere that we see protests, economies are threatened,” Prof Richard H Thaler, Nobel Laureate, told newspersons on the sidelines of the Prof Amitava Bose Memorial Lecture organised by the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta, here on Monday.

Thaler spoke on ‘Doing Economics in 21st century’.

India has been witnessing widespread protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), which was enacted into law on December 12, 2019.

“I was in Chile last month and Santiago is suffering in terms of tourism and so forth. What is going on in France also.... The only point I want to make is that all these countries have to figure out how to make peace with their citizens and I don’t pretend to know how to achieve this,” he said.

Thaler, who is considered the father of nudge theory, talked about the need for citizens to “nudge” their government to act responsibly.

“Citizens should always be nudging their country and their government to act responsible and it is the responsibility of the government and protesters to do this peacefully,” he said.

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