IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bas/econth/y2018i1p113-122.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The foundation of contemporary economics: James Buchanan and constitutional economics

Author

Listed:
  • Henrik Egbert
  • Teodor Sedlarski

Abstract

We provide a short introduction into the concept of Constitutional Economics. This approach is a subfield within Public Choice Theory. Public Choice and Constitutional Economics are closely related to the name of James Buchanan who, together with his colleagues, initiated Public Choice Theory in the 1950’s and Constitutional Economics in the 1980’s. The latter emphasizes the choice of these rules, e.g. the constitutional framework of a society that structures social order. The choice of rules is modeled as acts of exchange in the political process.

Suggested Citation

  • Henrik Egbert & Teodor Sedlarski, 2018. "The foundation of contemporary economics: James Buchanan and constitutional economics," Economic Thought journal, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences - Economic Research Institute, issue 1, pages 113-122.
    • Handle: RePEc:bas:econth:y:2018:i:1:p:113-122
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://etj.iki.bas.bg/storage/app/uploads/public/629/f42/6e0/629f426e03707145846104.pdf
    Download Restriction: Fee access (Bulgarian)
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. James Buchanan, 1990. "The domain of constitutional economics," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 1-18, December.
    2. Buchanan, James M, 1987. "The Constitution of Economic Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(3), pages 243-250, June.
    3. James M. Buchanan, 1949. "The Pure Theory of Government Finance: A Suggested Approach," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 57(6), pages 496-496.
    4. James Buchanan, 1993. "How can constitutions be designed so that politicians who seek to serve “public interest” can survive and prosper?," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 4(1), pages 1-6, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Pies, Ingo, 2004. "Wirtschaftsethik als Beitrag zur Ordnungspolitik: Ein interdisziplinäres Forschungsprogramm demokratischer Politikberatung," Discussion Papers 2004-5, Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg, Chair of Economic Ethics.
    2. Alain Marciano, 2009. "Buchanan’s constitutional political economy: exchange vs. choice in economics and in politics," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 20(1), pages 42-56, March.
    3. Randall G. Holcombe, 2020. "James M. Buchanan’s constitutional project: past and future," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 183(3), pages 371-387, June.
    4. Gebhard Kirchgässner, 2014. "The role of homo oeconomicus in the political economy of James Buchanan," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 25(1), pages 2-17, March.
    5. Viktor J. Vanberg, 2020. "J. M. Buchanan’s contractarian constitutionalism: political economy for democratic society," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 183(3), pages 339-370, June.
    6. Daniele Bertolini, 2019. "Constitutionalizing Leviathan: A Critique of Buchanan’s Conception of Lawmaking," Homo Oeconomicus: Journal of Behavioral and Institutional Economics, Springer, vol. 36(1), pages 41-69, October.
    7. Georg Vanberg, 2018. "Constitutional political economy, democratic theory and institutional design," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 177(3), pages 199-216, December.
    8. Lenger Alexander & Goldschmidt Nils, 2011. "Ordnungsökonomik als angewandte Wissenschaft. Zur notwendigen Zusammenführung von Theorie und Praxis / Constitutional Economics as an Applied Social Science. About the Essential Combination of Theory ," ORDO. Jahrbuch für die Ordnung von Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft, De Gruyter, vol. 62(1), pages 343-364, January.
    9. Karen Horn, 2020. "Richard E. Wagner (Ed.): James M. Buchanan—A theorist of political economy and social philosophy," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 31(2), pages 259-265, June.
    10. Marianne Johnson, 2005. "Wicksell's Unaminity Rule," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 64(4), pages 1049-1071, October.
    11. Bernd Hansjürgens, 2000. "The Influence of Knut Wicksell on Richard Musgrave and James Buchanan," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 103(1), pages 95-116, April.
    12. Ingo Pies & Philipp Schreck & Karl Homann, 2021. "Single-objective versus multi-objective theories of the firm: using a constitutional perspective to resolve an old debate," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 15(3), pages 779-811, April.
    13. Brian C. Albrecht & Joshua R. Hendrickson & Alexander William Salter, 2022. "Evolution, uncertainty, and the asymptotic efficiency of policy," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 192(1), pages 169-188, July.
    14. ., 2019. "Economic theory of non-territorial unbundling," Chapters, in: The Political Economy of Non-Territorial Exit, chapter 1, pages 14-38, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    15. Marianne Johnson, 2018. "Rules versus authorities," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 175(3), pages 219-228, June.
    16. Forte Francesco, 1996. "ETICA PUBBLICA Ε REGOLE DEL GIOCO. I DOVERI SOCIALI IN UNE SOCIETA LIBERALE: Compte rendu par Jean-Michel Josselin0 et Alain Marciano," Journal des Economistes et des Etudes Humaines, De Gruyter, vol. 7(1), pages 167-176, March.
    17. Ivaylo Donchev Beev, 2017. "Economic theory of constitution. English-American school," Economic Thought journal, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences - Economic Research Institute, issue 3, pages 131-151.
    18. Vanberg Viktor, 1993. "Constitutionally Constrained and Safeguarded Competition in Markets and Politics with reference to a European Constitution," Journal des Economistes et des Etudes Humaines, De Gruyter, vol. 4(1), pages 3-28, March.
    19. James Gwartney & Randall Holcombe, 2014. "Politics as exchange: the classical liberal economics and politics of James M. Buchanan," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 25(3), pages 265-279, September.
    20. Horst Hegmann, 1997. "Differing World-Views and Collective Action: The Case of Research," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 8(3), pages 179-194, September.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bas:econth:y:2018:i:1:p:113-122. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Diana Dimitrova (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ikbasbg.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.