Perspectives on Public Choice: A Handbook

by Edited by Dennis C. Mueller

• ISBN13: 9780521556545
• ISBN10: 0521556546
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1996-10-28
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

Public choice or rational politics differs from other approaches to the study of political behavior in that it builds on models in which rational individuals seek to advance their own interests. This five-part volume surveys the main ideas and contributions of the field. It contains twenty-five essays written by thirty scholars, both economists and political scientists, from North America and Europe. The contributors cover topics such as the nature and justification for the existence of government, the properties of different voting rules, and electoral politics in two-party governments.

Table of Contents

1. Public choice in perspective Dennis C. Mueller

Part I. The Need for and Forms of Cooperation: 2. Economic theories of the state Russell Hardin

3. Neither markets nor states: linking transformation processes in collective-action arenas Elinor Ostrom and James Walker

4. The political economy of Federalism Robert P. Inman and Daniel L. Rubinfeld

5. The public choice of international organizations Bruno S. Frey

6. Constitutional public choice Dennis C. Mueller

Part II. Voting Rules and Preference Aggregation: 7. Cycling and majority rule James M. Enelow

8. Majority rule Douglas W. Rae and Eric Schickler

9. Group choice and individual judgments H. Peyton Young

10. Some paradoxes of preference aggregation Prasanta K. Pattanaik

11. Voting and the revelation of preferences for public activities T. Nicolaus Tideman

Part III. Electoral Politics: 12. The spatial analysis of elections and committees: four decades of research Peter C. Ordeshook

13. Multiparty electoral politics Norman Schofield

14. Interest groups: money, information and influence David Austen Smith

15. Logrolling Thomas Stratmann

16. Political business cycles Martin Paldam

Part IV. Individual Behavior and Collective Action: 17. When is it rational to vote? John H. Aldrich

18. Voting behavior Morris P. Fiorina

19. Public Choice Experiments Elizabeth Hoffman

Part V. Public Choice in Action: 20. Modern bureaucratic theory Ronald Wintrobe

21. The positive theory of public bureaucracy Terry Moe

22. The political economy of taxation Walter Hettich and Stanley L. Winer

23. Rent seeking Robert D. Tollison

24. Endogenous protection: a survey Stephen P. Magee

25. Why does government's share of national income grow? An assessment of the recent literature on the US experience Cheryl M. Holsey and Thomas Borchering.