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This chapter summarizes the book's arguments and uses them to address two central questions: whether a paternalistic government is necessarily a nanny state that infantilizes its citizens and illegitimately erodes their autonomy, or whether it could be a helpful friend that promotes their well-being without undermining autonomy. The chapter suggests that the book's arguments provide a solid foundation for deciding on the appropriateness of government paternalism in general, of different forms of paternalism, and of the various types of paternalistic interventions. It argues that most of the definitions of paternalism common in the literature are unsatisfactory and proposes an alternative: to define paternalism in relation to reasoning failure. It concludes with the assertion that the state—as a helpful friend rather than a nanny state—can help its citizens achieve their own ends, and thereby promote their own well-being and that of the whole society.

Explores how far variety amongst risk regulation regimes can be explained by ‘market failure’ explanations of risk regulation. A ‘market failure’ approach assumes that state activity will consist of the minimal level of intervention needed to correct for specific failures in market or tort‐law processes created by risks—i.e. where the costs of individuals informing themselves about risks or opting out of risks through market or civil law methods are very high. This chapter analyses the market failure characteristics of the nine case‐study risks and then compares theoretical expectations with what is observed in practice. Analysis suggests that ‘market failure’ explanations can go some way in explaining observed regime variety, and certainly take us beyond superficial ideas of the ‘nanny state’ or its converse, but cannot predict a substantial proportion of observed features and paradoxes.

This chapter examines the argument that government paternalism harms or inappropriately restricts individual autonomy. More specifically, it considers the criticism that the paternalist government is actually a “nanny state”: the state is seen to treat its citizens as a nanny treats her charges, instead of as autonomous adults. After elaborating on the notion of autonomy, the chapter explores the relationship between paternalism, autonomy, and motivation. It then assesses the claim, associated with soft paternalism, that the individuals affected in fact have little autonomy to be violated. This position is based on the so-called autonomy failure—that is, the justification for paternalism depends in large part on a prior diminution of the individual's capacity for autonomous decision making, so that autonomy is therefore not offended by the intervention. The chapter describes the various circumstances in which this autonomy failure takes place and concludes by analyzing hard paternalism.

This book explores one of the major social questions of the twenty-first century: whether the government should save people from themselves. More specifically, it considers whether there are circumstances when the state, or the government of the state, should intervene to protect individuals from the possibly damaging consequences of their own decisions, even if those decisions affect only themselves, and even if the individuals concerned made the decisions while in full possession of their faculties and of all the relevant information. In other words, whether government paternalism can be justified. The book asks whether allowing the government to be the agent of paternalism creates a “nanny state” that invades the autonomy of the individuals concerned and potentially infantilizing them. Finally, it examines what form a paternalistic intervention should take and to what extent the rationale or consequences of government policies may be regarded as wholly or partly paternalistic.

Chapter Two consists of a general survey of Ottoman prison reform from the 1850s until the end of the empire (circa 1919) from a state-centric perspective. It pays particular attention to the development of programmes and policies, where they originated, the foundations they built for successive reforms, and how these reforms exemplify particular regime ideologies and world views. Woven throughout the chapter are six broad themes associated with Ottoman prison reform that include transformation through continuity and change as opposed to rupture, a focus by reformers on prisoner rehabilitation, administrative centralisation and governmentality, order and discipline, the creation and expansion of an Ottoman ‘nanny state’ in which the government increasingly assumes greater amounts of responsibility for the welfare of its population, and finally, the juxtaposition of prison reform with the reality of prison life. This chapter, therefore lays out the major topics of investigation that constitute the book’s remaining chapters.

This chapter reframes the project of public health within a rights framework. It argues that there is a right to health, and this entails that individuals have a right to public health. Given that there is a right to public health, the state should undertake to reduce health risks. If a state does not take easy steps to reduce risks to health, and as a result allows significant numbers to come to harm or even death, then it violates individuals’ right to public health, and should be criticized as a Neglectful State. The ethical challenge of public health policy is therefore not the one-sided one of avoiding Nannying, but the more complex task of steering a course between Nannying and Neglect. Avoiding Neglect may involve restricting liberty in various ways.