Liberty Fund

This book offers a new appraisal of quality competition, of selling effort, and of the fundamental weakness of contemporary welfare economics.

This is the second volume of Liberty Fund's "The Selected Works of Gordon Tullock", it is a reprint edition of the ground-breaking economic classic written by two of the world's preeminent economists -- Gordon Tullock and Nobel Laureate James M. Buchanan. This book is a unique blend of economics and political science that helped create significant new subfields in each discipline respectively, namely, the public choice school and constitutional political economy. Charles K. Rowley, Duncan Black Professor of Economics at George Mason University, points out in his introduction, "The Calculus of Consent" is, by a wide margin, the most widely cited publication of each coauthor and, by general agreement, their most important scientific contribution." The book is divided into four parts, each consisting of several chapters. The introduction by Professor Rowley provides a short overview of the book and identifies key insights that permeated the bounds of economics and political science and created an enduring nexus between the two sciences. Part I establishes the conceptual framework of the book's subject; part II defines the realm of social choice; part III applies the logic developed in part II to describe a range of decision-making rules, most notably, the rule of simple majority; while part IV explores the economics and ethics of democracy.

Commenting on his collaboration with Geoffrey Brennan on The Power to Tax, James M. Buchanan says that the book is "demonstrable proof of the value of genuine research collaboration across national-cultural boundaries." Buchanan goes on to say that "The Power to Tax is informed by a single idea-the implications of a revenue-maximizing government."

Originally published in 1980, The Power to Tax was a much-needed answer to the tax revolts sweeping across the United States. It was a much-needed answer as well in the academic circles of tax theory, where orthodox public finance models were clearly inadequate to the needs at hand.

The public-choice approach to taxation which Buchanan had earlier elaborated stood in direct opposition to public-finance orthodoxy. What Buchanan and Brennan constructed in The Power to Tax was a middle ground between the two. As Brennan writes in the foreword, "The underlying motivating question was simple: Why not borrow the motivational assumptions standard in public-choice theory and put them together with assumptions about policy-maker discretion taken from public-finance orthodoxy?"

The result was a controversial book-and a much misunderstood one as well. Looking back twenty years later, Brennan feels confirmed in the rightness of the theories he and Buchanan espoused, particularly in their unity with the public-choice tradition: "The insistence on motivational symmetry is a characteristic feature of the public choice approach, and it is in this dimension that The Power to Tax and the orthodox public- finance approach diverge."

James M. Buchanan (1919-2013) was an eminent economist who won the Alfred Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1986 and was considered one of the greatest scholars of liberty in the twentieth century.

The Calculus of Consent, the second volume of Liberty Fund's The Selected Works of Gordon Tullock, is a reprint edition of the ground-breaking economic classic written by two of the world's preeminent economists-Gordon Tullock and Nobel Laureate James M. Buchanan. This book is a unique blend of economics and political science that helped create significant new subfields in each discipline respectively, namely, the public choice school and constitutional political economy. Charles K. Rowley, Duncan Black Professor of Economics at George Mason University, points out in his introduction, "The Calculus of Consent is, by a wide margin, the most widely cited publication of each coauthor and, by general agreement, their most important scientific contribution."

The Calculus of Consent is divided into four parts, each consisting of several chapters. The introduction by Professor Rowley provides a short overview of the book and identifies key insights that permeated the bounds of economics and political science and created an enduring nexus between the two sciences. Part I of The Calculus of Consent establishes the conceptual framework of the book's subject; part II defines the realm of social choice; part III applies the logic developed in part II to describe a range of decision-making rules, most notably, the rule of simple majority; and part IV explores the economics and ethics of democracy.

Gordon Tullock is Professor Emeritus of Law at George Mason University, where he was Distinguished Research Fellow in the Center for Study of Public Choice and University Professor of Law and Economics. He also taught at the University of South Carolina, the University of Virginia, Rice University, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, and the University of Arizona. In 1966 he founded the journal that became Public Choice and remained its editor until 1990.

James M. Buchanan is an eminent economist who won the Alfred Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1986 and is considered one of the greatest scholars of liberty of the twentieth century. He is also Professor Emeritus at George Mason and Virginia Tech Universities.

Charles K. Rowley was Duncan Black Professor of Economics at George Mason University and a Senior Fellow of the James M. Buchanan Center for Political Economy at George Mason University. He was also General Director of the Locke Institute.

Reflections on Ethics, Freedom, Welfare Economics, Policy, and the Legacy of Austrian Economics collects Kirzner's essays on social thought. At heart, his work is not prescriptive but analytical. He does not cast unsubstantiated judgments on modern economics or spout a blind return to laissez-faire; instead, he starts with examining how markets function, working from the ground up. In the words of the volume editors, "Kirzner contends that in order to make ethical judgments about a social system, one must first understand the science behind it."

From the impact of governmental regulation on the entrepreneurial discovery process to the role of institutions in sustaining prosperity, Kirzner's work shows that the free market is a necessary element in maintaining social harmony and bringing stability to our constantly changing world.

In his foreword, Geoffrey Brennan states, "The papers in this volume represent a coherent set of pieces focused on aspects of public-expenditure theory and constitute all of Buchanan's papers in this area." Buchanan's work on the subject of what governments should do and his insistence on Knut Wicksell's ideal that taxation and public expenditure be integrated topics have contributed significantly to the current thinking of most economists on the topic. Geoffrey Brennan summarises Buchanan's central themes in this way, "There are two messages that emerge from this work: one is that a proper sense of the extent of market failure, rather than its mere presence, is relevant in all cases; the other is that 'correcting' for such market failure is often a complex multidimensional business not captured by direct public provision at zero price and not necessarily involving expansion of market output." The twenty-nine papers represented in this volume are grouped into these major subject categories: public services and collective action, externalities, clubs and joint supply, public goods theory, applications -- city, health, and social security, distributive norms and collective action. This volume also includes what are arguably Buchanan's two most famous articles: 'Externality', which he wrote with William Stubblebine, and 'Economic Theory of Clubs'.

Sir Edward Coke remains one of the most important figures in the history of the common law. The essays collected in this volume provide a broad context for understanding and appreciating the scope of Coke's achievement: his theory of law, his work as a lawyer and a judge, his role in pioneering judicial review, his leadership of the Commons, and his place in the broader culture of Elizabethan and Jacobean England.

Sir Edward Coke claimed for judges the power to strike down statutes, created the modern common law by reshaping medieval precedents, and, in the House of Commons, led the gathering forces that would ultimately establish a constitutional regime of ordered liberty and responsible, representative government.

Although much has been written on Coke, there has been no single adequate study or collection of these writings until now. Law, Liberty, and Parliament brings together material that not only is useful for understanding Coke's career and achievement but also illuminates the late Elizabethan and early Stuart periods in which the common law became inextricably identified with constitutional authority.

Allen D. Boyer, author of Sir Edward Coke and the Elizabethan Age, is a lawyer in New York City and a frequent contributor to the New York Times Book Review. Dr. Boyer serves on the advisory board of the Yale Center for Parliamentary History.

In his foreword, Geoffrey Brennan states, "The papers in this volume represent a coherent set of pieces focused on aspects of public-expenditure theory and constitute all of Buchanan's papers in this area."

Buchanan's work on the subject of what governments should do and his insistence on Knut Wicksell's ideal that taxation and public expenditure be integrated topics have contributed significantly to the current thinking of most economists on the topic. Geoffrey Brennan summarizes Buchanan's central themes in this way, "There are two messages that emerge from this work: one is that a proper sense of the extent of market failure, rather than its mere presence, is relevant in all cases; the other is that 'correcting' for such market failure is often a complex multidimensional business not captured by direct public provision at zero price and not necessarily involving expansion of market output."

The twenty-nine papers represented in this volume are grouped into these major subject categories:

1. Public Services and Collective Action

2. Externalities

3. Clubs and Joint Supply

4. Public Goods Theory

5. Applications-City, Health, and Social Security

6. Distributive Norms and Collective Action

This volume also includes what are arguably Buchanan's two most famous articles: "Externality," which he wrote with William Stubblebine, and "Economic Theory of Clubs."

James M. Buchanan (1919-2013) was an eminent economist who won the Alfred Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1986 and was considered one of the greatest scholars of liberty in the twentieth century.

Richard M. Weaver (1910-1963) was one of the leading figures in the post-World War II development of an intellectual, self-conscious conservatism. His thought and his appreciation of liberty were rooted in his understanding of Southern history. He believed that Southern values of religion, work ethic, and family could provide a defense against the totalitarian nihilism of fascist and communist statism.This collection of fourteen essays demonstrates George Core's point that "few writers of the South rival Richard Weaver in comprehensiveness of vision and depth of thought."George M. Curtis, III, is a Senior Fellow of Liberty Fund.James J. Thompson, Jr., is the author of three books.