The Calculus of Consent

by Buchanan, James M.

• ISBN13: 9780865972186
• ISBN10: 0865972184
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-08-01
• Publisher: Liberty Fund

Summary

THE CALCULUS OF CONSENT was co-authored by Buchanan with Gordon Tullock, with whom Buchanan collaborated on many books and academic enterprises throughout their careers. As Robert D Tollison states in the foreword: (this book) is a radical departure from the way democracies conduct their business. The 'Calculus' is already a book for the ages. This classic work analyses the political organisation of a free society through the lens of the economic organisation of society. The authors acknowledge their unease as economists in analysing the political organisation, but they take the risk of forging into unfamiliar territory because they believe the benefits of their perspective will bear much fruit. As the authors state, their objective in this book is "to analyze the calculus of the rational individual when he is faced with questions of constitutional choice... We examine the (choice) process extensively only with reference to the problem of decision-making rules." The authors describe their approach as 'economic individualism'. They believe that economists have explored individual choice extensively in the market sector while social scientists have largely ignored the dynamics of individual decision-making in the dynamics of forming group action in the public sector. Written in the early 1960s, THE CALCULUS OF CONSENT has become a bulwark of the public choice movement for which James M Buchanan is so justly famous.

Table of Contents

Foreword	ix
Preface	xv
I. The Conceptual Framework
Introduction	3	(8)
The Individualistic Postulate	11	(5)
Politics and the Economic Nexus	16	(15)
Individual Rationality in Social Choice	31	(12)
II. The Realm of Social Choice
The Organization of Human Activity	43	(20)
A Generalized Economic Theory of Constitutions	63	(22)
The Rule of Unanimity	85	(12)
The Costs of Decision-Making	97	(22)
III. Analyses of Decision-Making Rules
The Structure of the Models	119	(13)
Simple Majority Voting	132	(17)
Simple Majority Voting and the Theory of Games	149	(23)
Majority Rule, Game Theory, and Pareto Optimality	172	(18)
Pareto Optimality, External Costs, and Income Redistribution	190	(10)
The Range and Extent of Collective Action	200	(10)
Qualified Majority Voting Rules, Representation, and the Interdependence of Constitutional Variables	210	(21)
The Bicameral Legislature	231	(16)
The Orthodox Model of Majority Rule	247	(18)
IV. The Economics and the Ethics of Democracy
Democratic Ethics and Economic Efficiency	265	(17)
Pressure Groups, Special Interests, and the Constitution	282	(13)
The Politics of the Good Society	295	(10)
Appendix 1. Marginal Notes on Reading Political Philosophy	305	(21)
James M. Buchanan
Appendix 2. Theoretical Forerunners	326	(25)
Gordon Tullock
Name Index	351	(2)
Subject Index	353