Liberty Fund Books

Description

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; while part IV explores the economics and ethics of democracy.

Charles K. Rowley is 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 is also General Director of the Locke Institute.

The entire series includes:

Volume 1: Virginia Political Economy
Volume 2: The Calculus of Consent
Volume 3: The Organization of Inquiry (November 2004)
Volume 4: The Economics of Politics (February 2005)
Volume 5: The Rent-Seeking Society (March 2005)
Volume 6: Bureaucracy (June 2005)
Volume 7: The Economics and Politics of Wealth Redistribution (July 2005)
Volume 8: The Social Dilemma: Of Autocracy, Revolution, Coup d'Etat, and War (December 2005)
Volume 9: Law and Economics (December 2005)
Volume 10: Economics without Frontiers (January 2006)

Table of Contents

Introduction, by Charles K. Rowley ix

James McGill Buchanan, by Gordon Tullock xix


Preface xxi

PART I. THE CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

1. Introduction 3

2. The Individualistic Postulate 11

3. Politics and the Economic Nexus 16

4. Individual Rationality in Social Choice 30


PART II. THE REALM OF SOCIAL CHOICE

5. The Organization of Human Activity 41

6. A Generalized Economic Theory of Constitutions 60

7. The Rule of Unanimity 81

8. The Costs of Decision-Making 93


PART III. ANALYSES OF DECISION-MAKING RULES

9. The Structure of the Models 115

10. Simple Majority Voting 127

11. Simple Majority Voting and the Theory of Games 143

12. Majority Rule, Game Theory, and Pareto Optimality 165

13. Pareto Optimality, External Costs, and Income Redistribution 182

14. The Range and Extent of Collective Action 192

15. Qualified Majority Voting Rules, Representation, and

the Interdependence of Constitutional Variables 202

16. The Bicameral Legislature 222

17. The Orthodox Model of Majority Rule 237


PART IV. THE ECONOMICS AND THE ETHICS OF DEMOCRACY

18. Democratic Ethics and Economic Efficiency 253

19. Pressure Groups, Special Interests, and the Constitution 269

20. The Politics of the Good Society 281


APPENDIX 1

Marginal Notes on Reading Political Philosophy,

by James M. Buchanan 291


APPENDIX 2

Theoretical Forerunners, by Gordon Tullock 310


Index 333