IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/jothpo/v3y1991i4p355-378.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Why the Traditional Distinction between Public and Private Goods Should be Abandoned

Author

Listed:
  • Jesse Malkin
  • Aaron Wildavsky

Abstract

In this paper we challenge the traditional distinction between public goods and private goods. Economists use a definition of public goods that rests on the inherent properties of the good itself. Referring to criteria such as non-rivalness and non-excludability, they assert that the distinction is fixed in nature and cannot be altered by human observes. We argue that the boundary between public and private goods is socially constructed. That is, what is a public good and what is a private good is not determined by fixed criteria; rather it is decided by society. Thus, what is a public good in one community might be a private good in another. It is this moveable boundary between public and private that makes it essential to analyźe public policy with values up front, not hidden behind the seemingly technical concept of public goods.

Suggested Citation

  • Jesse Malkin & Aaron Wildavsky, 1991. "Why the Traditional Distinction between Public and Private Goods Should be Abandoned," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 3(4), pages 355-378, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jothpo:v:3:y:1991:i:4:p:355-378
    DOI: 10.1177/0951692891003004001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0951692891003004001
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0951692891003004001?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bohm, Peter, 1972. "Estimating demand for public goods: An experiment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 3(2), pages 111-130.
    2. Bergstrom, Theodore C & Goodman, Robert P, 1973. "Private Demands for Public Goods," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 63(3), pages 280-296, June.
    3. repec:bla:kyklos:v:36:y:1983:i:3:p:377-96 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Orr, Larry L, 1976. "Income Transfers as a Public Good: An Application to AFDC," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 66(3), pages 359-371, June.
    5. Roland Vaubel, 1984. "The Government's Money Monopoly: Externalities or Natural Monopoly?," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(1), pages 27-58, February.
    6. David W. Pearce, 1981. "The Macmillan Dictionary of Modern Economics," Palgrave Macmillan Books, Palgrave Macmillan, number 978-1-349-04781-9.
    7. Ostrom, Vincent & Tiebout, Charles M. & Warren, Robert, 1961. "The Organization of Government in Metropolitan Areas: A Theoretical Inquiry," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 55(4), pages 831-842, December.
    8. Olson, Mancur, Jr, 1969. "The Principle of "Fiscal Equivalence": The Division of Responsibilities among Different Levels of Government," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 59(2), pages 479-487, May.
    9. Cornes, Richard & Sandler, Todd, 1985. "On the consistency of conjectures with public goods," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 125-129, June.
    10. Hori, Hajime, 1975. "Revealed Preference for Public Goods," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 65(5), pages 978-991, December.
    11. repec:bla:ecorec:v:55:y:1979:i:149:p:95-107 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Lester C. Thurow, 1971. "The Income Distribution as a Pure Public Good," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 85(2), pages 327-336.
    13. H. Frech, 1973. "The public choice theory of murray N. Rothbard, a modern anarchist," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 14(1), pages 143-154, March.
    14. Peter Bohm, 1971. "An Approach to the Problem of Estimating Demand for Public Goods," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Peter Bohm & Allen V. Kneese (ed.), The Economics of Environment, pages 94-105, Palgrave Macmillan.
    15. Demsetz, Harold, 1970. "The Private Production of Public Goods," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 13(2), pages 293-306, October.
    16. JOHN McMILLAN, 1979. "The Free‐Rider Problem: A Survey," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 55(2), pages 95-107, June.
    17. Johansen, Leif, 1977. "The theory of public goods: Misplaced emphasis?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 147-152, February.
    18. William J. Baumol, 1986. "Microtheory: Applications and Origins," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262022451, December.
    19. Charles P. Kindleberger, 1983. "Standards as Public, Collective and Private Goods," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(3), pages 377-396, August.
    20. Musgrave, Richard A, 1970. "Pareto Optimal Redistribution: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 60(5), pages 991-993, December.
    21. Bernheim, B Douglas, 1986. "On the Voluntary and Involuntary Provision of Public Goods," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(4), pages 789-793, September.
    22. Brito, Dagobert L & Oakland, William H, 1980. "On the Monopolistic Provision of Excludable Public Goods," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(4), pages 691-704, September.
    23. Ellickson, Bryan, 1973. "A Generalization of the Pure Theory of Public Goods," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 63(3), pages 417-432, June.
    24. Peter Bohm, 1972. "Estimating the demand for public goods: An experiment," Framed Field Experiments 00126, The Field Experiments Website.
    25. Marwell, Gerald & Ames, Ruth E., 1981. "Economists free ride, does anyone else? : Experiments on the provision of public goods, IV," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(3), pages 295-310, June.
    26. Albert Breton, 1964. "The Economics of Nationalism," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 72(4), pages 376-376.
    27. Coase, R H, 1974. "The Lighthouse in Economics," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 17(2), pages 357-376, October.
    28. Deacon, Robert T & Shapiro, Perry, 1975. "Private Preference for Collective Goods Revealed Through Voting on Referenda," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 65(5), pages 943-955, December.
    29. E. Pasour, 1981. "Pareto optimality as a guide to income redistribution," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 36(1), pages 75-87, January.
    30. Tullock, Gordon, 1971. "Public Decisions as Public Goods," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 79(4), pages 913-918, July-Aug..
    31. Mishan, E J, 1972. "The Futility of Pareto-Efficient Distributions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 62(5), pages 971-976, December.
    32. Goldfarb, Robert S, 1970. "Pareto Optimal Redistribution: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 60(5), pages 994-996, December.
    33. Kenneth Goldin, 1977. "Equal access vs. Selective access: A critique of public goods theory," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 29(1), pages 53-71, March.
    34. Head, John G & Shoup, Carl S, 1969. "Public Goods, Private Goods, and Ambiguous Goods," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 79(315), pages 567-572, September.
    35. Paul M. Romer, 1990. "Capital, Labor, and Productivity," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 21(1990 Micr), pages 337-367.
    36. Hochman, Harold M & Rodgers, James D, 1970. "Pareto Optimal Redistribution: Reply," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 60(5), pages 997-1002, December.
    37. Kindleberger, C. P., 1972. "The benefits of international money," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 2(4), pages 425-442, September.
    38. Roland Artle & Christian Averous, 1973. "The Telephone System as a Public Good: Static and Dynamic Aspects," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 4(1), pages 89-100, Spring.
    39. Hochman, Harold M & Rodgers, James D, 1969. "Pareto Optimal Redistribution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 59(4), pages 542-557, Part I Se.
    40. Barzel, Yoram, 1971. "The Market for a Semipublic Good: The Case of the American Economic Review," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 61(4), pages 665-674, September.
    41. Smith, Vernon L, 1980. "Experiments with a Decentralized Mechanism for Public Good Decisions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(4), pages 584-599, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Priddat, Birger P., 2008. "Öffentliche Güter als politische Güter," ZögU - Zeitschrift für öffentliche und gemeinwirtschaftliche Unternehmen, Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG, vol. 31(2), pages 152-173.
    2. Marco Verweij, 2009. "Is International Customary Law Coordinated, Constructed, or Contested?. Comment," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 165(1), pages 95-98, March.
    3. Maxime Desmarais-Tremblay, 2014. "On the Definition of Public Goods. Assessing Richard A. Musgrave's contribution," Post-Print halshs-00951577, HAL.
    4. Yang, Chia-yen, 2000. "The organizational choice of public good provision," ISU General Staff Papers 2000010108000013664, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    5. Faruk ÜLGEN, 2018. "Financial stability as a global public good and relevant systemic regulation as a problem of collective action," CIRIEC Studies Series, in: Philippe BANCE & CIRIEC (ed.), Providing public goods and commons. Towards coproduction and new forms of governance for a revival of public action, volume 1, chapter 5, pages 95-112, CIRIEC - Université de Liège.
    6. Gisela Di Meglio, 2013. "The place of ServPPINs in the range of public–private collaboration arrangements for services provision," Chapters, in: Faïz Gallouj & Luis Rubalcaba & Paul Windrum (ed.), Public–Private Innovation Networks in Services, chapter 3, pages 59-87, Edward Elgar Publishing.

    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. Ledyard, John O., "undated". "Public Goods: A Survey of Experimental Research," Working Papers 861, California Institute of Technology, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences.
    2. Vijlbrief, J.A., 1992. "Equity and efficiency in unemployment insurance," Serie Research Memoranda 0014, VU University Amsterdam, Faculty of Economics, Business Administration and Econometrics.
    3. Sánchez, Isabel, 1991. "La provision voluntaria de bienes publicos: Resultados Experimentales," DE - Documentos de Trabajo. Economía. DE 3000, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Departamento de Economía.
    4. Bruce D. Fitzgerald, 1975. "Self-Interest or Altruism," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 19(3), pages 462-479, September.
    5. Sandler, Todd & Tschirhart, John T, 1980. "The Economic Theory of Clubs: An Evaluative Survey," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 18(4), pages 1481-1521, December.
    6. E. Pasour, 1981. "Pareto optimality as a guide to income redistribution," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 36(1), pages 75-87, January.
    7. David Goetze, 1994. "Comparing Prisoner's Dilemma, Commons Dilemma, and Public Goods Provision Designs in Laboratory Experiments," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 38(1), pages 56-86, March.
    8. JOHN McMILLAN, 1979. "The Free‐Rider Problem: A Survey," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 55(2), pages 95-107, June.
    9. Hummel Jeffrey Rogers & Lavoie Don, 1994. "National Defense And The Public-Goods Problem," Journal des Economistes et des Etudes Humaines, De Gruyter, vol. 5(2-3), pages 353-378, June.
    10. Harrison, Glenn W & Hirshleifer, Jack, 1989. "An Experimental Evaluation of Weakest Link/Best Shot Models of Public Goods," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(1), pages 201-225, February.
    11. Eli Noam, 1982. "Demand functions and the valuation of public goods," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 38(3), pages 271-280, January.
    12. Charles Plott, 2014. "Public choice and the development of modern laboratory experimental methods in economics and political science," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 25(4), pages 331-353, December.
    13. Klein, Daniel B, 1990. "The Voluntary Provision of Public Goods? The Turnpike Companies of Early America," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 28(4), pages 788-812, October.
    14. Joe Oppenheimer, 1985. "Public choice and three ethical properties of politics," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 45(3), pages 241-255, January.
    15. J. Giertz, 1982. "A limited defense of Pareto optimal redistribution," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 39(2), pages 277-282, January.
    16. Erzo F. P. Luttmer, 2001. "Group Loyalty and the Taste for Redistribution," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 109(3), pages 500-528, June.
    17. Christian Morrisson & Philippe Cazenave, 1972. "Fonctions d'utilité interdépendantes et théorie de la redistribution en économie d'échange," Revue Économique, Programme National Persée, vol. 23(2), pages 214-242.
    18. Don Coursey & William Schulze, 1986. "The application of laboratory experimental economics to the contingent valuation of public goods," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 49(1), pages 47-68, January.
    19. Jeffrey S. Zax & Casey Ichniowski, 1991. "Excludability and the Effects of Free Riders: Right-To-Work Laws and Local Public Sector Unionization," Public Finance Review, , vol. 19(3), pages 293-315, July.
    20. Thomas A. Husted, 1990. "Micro-Based Examination of the Demand for Income-Redistribution Benefits," Public Finance Review, , vol. 18(2), pages 157-181, April.

    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:sae:jothpo:v:3:y:1991:i:4:p:355-378. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.