If someone asked you for a bribe and you offered them a zero denomination note, how do you think they would react? Woild they get angry and demand the full bribe they were asking for or apologise and back down?
Surprisingly in India as this story about a zero rupee note that Indians can slip to corrupt officials who demand bribes explains the reaction seems to be the latter. Yes I can hardly believe it either. One posited explanation is that they shock people into honesty.
I often think that confronting people with the reality of their actions or behaviour in an in indirect, non-threatening way can cause them to reflect and change. Maybe we should experiment more with counter-intuitive ideas like this one. So often our intuition gets things wrong - nothing beats testing ideas - even crazy - ones in practice.
