What does the word 'compliance' mean? On the face of it, we've all had experience of it under COVID as governments have introduced rules to influence our behaviour to stop the spread of the virus. But its influence is far broader than that, with applications ranging from corporate environments to the medical profession. It's even become an industry in its own right, complete with its own professional organizations and creating an ever-growing stream of jobs. As a result, the term has various meanings and academic studies looking at how it influences human decision-making have often been undertaken in siloes. If we want to understand what compliance means and how its objectives can be more effectively delivered, we need to look across the spectrum of applications.

My guests on this episode, Professors Benjamin van Rooij and Danny Sokol, are the co-authors of a new book called The Cambridge Handbook of Compliance which seeks to meet this challenge. The Handbook takes a broad approach and explores the idea of compliance as being the interaction between rules and behaviour. Using this framing, it sets out to deliver a comprehensive understanding of what compliance is and what mechanisms and interventions are used in its service.

By exploring different contexts and ideas, the Handbook explains what compliance is and provides a guide to how its objectives can be more effectively delivered. In our discussion, which was originally filmed as a video that we’ll be sharing as clips on social media, Benjamin and Danny explain why they wrote the book and what they hope to achieve and highlight some of the key themes it covers. By understanding what compliance is, and how its objectives can be more effectively met, we can adopt what Danny and Benjamin call Compliance 2.0.
They also reveal their favourite or least favourite rule!

Not only are Danny and Benjamin engaging guests, but their insights will be of interest to those working in compliance and those of us who are subject to compliance requirements. In other words, all of us!

For more on The Cambridge Handbook of Compliance 👉https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/cambridge-handbook-of-compliance/A7A803D987C9C001C6569395BEE5051C

To download the Introductory Chapter of the Handbook for free 👉https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3563295
To find out more about Benjamin and his research:
👉 https://www.law.uci.edu/faculty/affiliated/van-rooij/
👉 https://www.uva.nl/en/profile/r/o/b.vanrooij/b.vanrooij.html

To find out more about Danny and his research:
👉https://www.law.ufl.edu/faculty/d-daniel-sokol
👉https://www.whitecase.com/people/daniel-sokol

To hear Benjamin's previous appearances on the podcast:
On his book 'The Behavioural Code' 👉 https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/professor-benjamin-van-rooij-on-the-behavioural-code/
On his research into COVID Compliance 👉https://www.humanriskpodcast.com/professor-benjamin-van-rooij-on-covid-compliance/