IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/revaec/v31y2018i2d10.1007_s11138-017-0381-4.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The limits of liberalism: Good boundaries must be discovered

Author

Listed:
  • Adam Martin

    (Texas Tech University)

Abstract

Determining good boundaries for governance jurisdictions is among the most difficult problems in political theory and political philosophy. But to whom the rules of a given jurisdiction applies is a problem that afflicts private as well as public governance. Clubs have boundaries no less than cities, states, or nations. This essay applies Hayek’s conception of competition as a discovery procedure to boundary problems, arguing that good jurisdictional boundaries are subject to a great deal of contingent variation according to particular the conditions of time and place. Philosophical speculation, therefore, cannot fully replace a trial and error process that facilitates social learning about where good boundaries fall. I outline the features of good boundaries that make them subject to such variation, then evaluate two criteria for evaluating whether existing jurisdictional boundaries are good: one that emphasizes ex ante consent to boundaries, and one that focuses on the ability of individuals to exit from jurisdictions ex post, arguing that the exit-focused approach is underappreciated.

Suggested Citation

  • Adam Martin, 2018. "The limits of liberalism: Good boundaries must be discovered," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 31(2), pages 265-276, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:revaec:v:31:y:2018:i:2:d:10.1007_s11138-017-0381-4
    DOI: 10.1007/s11138-017-0381-4
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11138-017-0381-4
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11138-017-0381-4?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
    ---><---

    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. Bruce Benson, 1999. "To Arbitrate or To Litigate: That Is the Question," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 8(2), pages 91-151, September.
    2. James M. Buchanan, 1962. "Politics, Policy, and the Pigovian Margins," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Chennat Gopalakrishnan (ed.), Classic Papers in Natural Resource Economics, chapter 10, pages 204-218, Palgrave Macmillan.
    3. Stringham, Edward Peter, 2015. "Private Governance: Creating Order in Economic and Social Life," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199365166.
    4. Richard E. Wagner, 2007. "Fiscal Sociology and the Theory of Public Finance," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 12713.
    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. Mikayla Novak, 2021. "Social innovation and Austrian economics: Exploring the gains from intellectual trade," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 34(1), pages 129-147, March.

    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. Alexander William Salter, 2016. "Political Property Rights and Governance Outcomes: A Theory of the Corporate Polity," Journal of Private Enterprise, The Association of Private Enterprise Education, vol. 31(Winter 20), pages 1-20.
    2. Peter Boettke & Alain Marciano, 2015. "The past, present and future of Virginia Political Economy," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 163(1), pages 53-65, April.
    3. Adam Martin, 2020. "The subjectivist-contrarian position," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 183(3), pages 479-494, June.
    4. Bernholz, Peter, 1997. "Property rights, contracts, cyclical social preferences and the Coase theorem: A synthesis," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 419-442, September.
    5. Allen, Darcy W.E. & Berg, Chris & Markey-Towler, Brendan & Novak, Mikayla & Potts, Jason, 2020. "Blockchain and the evolution of institutional technologies: Implications for innovation policy," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(1).
    6. Marciano, Alain, 2011. "Buchanan on externalities: An exercise in applied subjectivism," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 80(2), pages 280-289.
    7. Jeremy Horpedahl, 2012. "Adrian Vermeule: The system of the constitution," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 153(3), pages 507-509, December.
    8. 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 1-26, June.
    9. David J. Hebert, 2017. "Pascal Salin, competition, coordination and diversity: From the firm to economic integration," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 30(1), pages 143-146, March.
    10. Roger Congleton, 2014. "The contractarian constitutional political economy of James Buchanan," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 25(1), pages 39-67, March.
    11. Farole, Thomas & Moberg, Lotta, 2014. "It worked in China, so why not in Africa? The political economy challenge of Special Economic Zones," WIDER Working Paper Series 152, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    12. Peter Boettke & Christopher Coyne & Peter Leeson, 2011. "Quasimarket failure," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 149(1), pages 209-224, October.
    13. Skarbek, David, 2016. "Covenants without the Sword? Comparing Prison Self-Governance Globally," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 110(4), pages 845-862, November.
    14. Bruce Benson, 2018. "The institutional determinants of self-governance: a comment on Edward Stringham’s Private Governance," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 31(2), pages 209-230, June.
    15. Matthew C. Rousu, 2018. "Using Show Tunes to Teach about Free (and Not-So-Free) Markets," Journal of Private Enterprise, The Association of Private Enterprise Education, vol. 33(Winter 20), pages 111-128.
    16. Schöbel Enrico, 2018. "Finanzsoziologie und Steuerpsychologie: Wiederentdeckungen einer sozio-ökonomischen Finanzwissenschaft: Anmerkungen zu den Büchern von Rudolf Goldscheid, Max Haller (Hg.), Stephan Mühlbacher und Maxim," ORDO. Jahrbuch für die Ordnung von Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft, De Gruyter, vol. 69(1), pages 442-452, July.
    17. Richard Wagner, 2013. "What kind of state in our future? Fact and Conjecture in Vito Tanzi’s Government versus Markets," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 26(1), pages 93-104, March.
    18. Petrik Runst, 2016. "Giacomo Corneo, Bessere Welt. Berlin, Germany: Goldegg Verlag, 2014. 368 Pages. 24,90 € (hardcover)," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 29(1), pages 99-102, March.
    19. Alain Marciano, 2019. "Buchanan and public finance: The tennessee years," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 32(1), pages 21-46, March.
    20. David Skarbek & Peng Wang, 2015. "Criminal rituals," Global Crime, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(4), pages 288-305, October.

    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:kap:revaec:v:31:y:2018:i:2:d:10.1007_s11138-017-0381-4. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.