Insurance and Prevention: Ethical Aspects

In recent decades, prevention policies—i.e., insurance policies constructed to give incentives to investments in prevention
and thereby reduce reliance on insurance—have been much discussed both with regard to different kinds of market insurance
and, albeit primarily within a European context and in relation to an ongoing discussion about the need for a shift towards
an “active” welfare state, with regard to social insurance. The present contribution identifies normative issues that deserve
attention in relation to a general introduction of prevention policies in market insurance and social insurance. It is argued
that the importance of these normative issues suggests that arguments and distinctions drawn from moral and political philosophy
should play a more prominent role both in the debate on the shift towards an active welfare state and the use of prevention
policies in market insurance.