I sometimes worry that focus on effectiveness creates perverse incentives in strategic settings, leading us to become less effective. Here are a few observations illustrating this concern.

Effectiveness-focused advocacy creates perverse incentives for adversaries

When we conduct cage-free campaigns, the target companies frequently ask us why they are being targeted instead of some other company. While trying to answer that, one immediately realises the following tension. If we say that "because targeting you is the most effective thing we can do", we incentivise them to not budge. Because they will know that willingness to compromise invites more aggression.

When dealing with an effectiveness-focused movement, our adversaries are further incentivised to prevent concrete results. While other movements will have to be destroyed through pressure, an effectiveness-focused movement will easily go away if you just prove to them that they can be more effective elsewhere.

For that reason, in our [...]

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Outline:

(00:21) Effectiveness-focused advocacy creates perverse incentives for adversaries

(01:20) Sometimes you have to fight back even when it's not the most effective thing to do

(02:05) Religious rules survive because they are stubborn

(02:39) We might need more commitment devices

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First published:
April 8th, 2025

Source:
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/tvcEa9LhsX264NZbf/maybe-we-aren-t-stubborn-enough

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