IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/19835.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Public Choice: an Overview

Author

Listed:
  • Borooah, Vani

Abstract

Public Choice begins with the observation that in politics, as in economics, individuals and institutions compete for scarce resources and that, therefore, the same methods of analyses used by economists to explain the behaviour of consumers and producers might also serve well to explain the behaviour of governments and other (allegedly) “public-spirited” organisations . As Tullock (1988) succinctly put it, Public Choice is "the invasion of politics by economics". Public Choice derives its rationale from the fact that, in many areas, 'political' and 'economic' considerations interact so that a proper understanding of issues in one field requires a complementary understanding of issues in the other. Although the incursion of the analytical methods of economics into political science - which is the hall-mark of Public Choice - began in the 1950s, it was not until at least three decades later that the trickle became a flood. This chapter provides an overview of this field.

Suggested Citation

  • Borooah, Vani, 2005. "Public Choice: an Overview," MPRA Paper 19835, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:19835
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/19835/1/MPRA_paper_19835.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bhagwati, Jagdish N, 1982. "Directly Unproductive, Profit-seeking (DUP) Activities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(5), pages 988-1002, October.
    2. Peltzman, Sam, 1980. "The Growth of Government," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 23(2), pages 209-287, October.
    3. Mueller,Dennis C., 2003. "Public Choice III," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521894753, Enero-Abr.
    4. Frey, Bruno S & Schneider, Friedrich, 1978. "A Politico-Economic Model of the United Kingdom," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 88(350), pages 243-253, June.
    5. Browning, Edgar K & Johnson, William R, 1984. "The Trade-Off between Equality and Efficiency," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 92(2), pages 175-203, April.
    6. Borooah, Vani, 2002. "Employment Inequality, Employment Regulation, and Social Welfare," MPRA Paper 20008, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Peltzman, Sam, 1980. "The Growth of Government," Working Papers 1, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, George J. Stigler Center for the Study of the Economy and the State.
    8. Meltzer, Allan H & Richard, Scott F, 1981. "A Rational Theory of the Size of Government," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(5), pages 914-927, October.
    9. Atkinson, Anthony B., 1970. "On the measurement of inequality," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 2(3), pages 244-263, September.
    10. William D. Nordhaus, 1975. "The Political Business Cycle," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 42(2), pages 169-190.
    11. Peltzman, Sam, 1980. "The Growth of Government," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 23(2), pages 209-287, October.
    12. Robert D. Tollison, 1982. "Rent Seeking: A Survey," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(4), pages 575-602, November.
    13. Amnon Levy & João R. Faria (ed.), 2002. "Economic Growth, Inequality and Migration," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 1647, December.
    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. Brenda Mutengambiri & Daniel Somane & Chipo Joyce Chigome & Gay Gweshe & Mervis Chiware, 2024. "Five-year Performance Contracts and Service Delivery in Local Authorities in Zimbabwe: The Case of Ruwa," Journal of Public Administration and Governance, Macrothink Institute, vol. 14(1), pages 103117-1031, December.

    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. Daniel E. Ingberman & Robert P. Inman, 1987. "The Political Economy of Fiscal Policy," NBER Working Papers 2405, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Thomas A. Garrett & Russell M. Rhine, 2006. "On the size and growth of government," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 88(Jan), pages 13-30.
    3. Jørgen Andersen, 2012. "Costs of taxation and the size of government," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 153(1), pages 83-115, October.
    4. K. L. Glen Ueng & C. C. Yang, 2006. "Tax Evasion and Government Size - A Micro-Political Theory," Journal of Economics and Management, College of Business, Feng Chia University, Taiwan, vol. 2(1), pages 1-20, January.
    5. Persson, Torsten & Tabellini, Guido, 2002. "Political economics and public finance," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 24, pages 1549-1659, Elsevier.
    6. Randall Holcombe, 2005. "Government growth in the twenty-first century," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 124(1), pages 95-114, July.
    7. Birdsall, Nancy & James, Estelle, 1992. "Health, government, and the poor : the case for the private sector," Policy Research Working Paper Series 938, The World Bank.
    8. Toke S. Aidt & Francisco José Veiga & Linda Gonçalves Veiga, 2007. "Election Results and Opportunistic Policies: An Integrated Approach," NIPE Working Papers 24/2007, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.
    9. Micael Castanheira & Gaëtan Nicodème & Paola Profeta, 2012. "On the political economics of tax reforms: survey and empirical assessment," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 19(4), pages 598-624, August.
    10. Dennis Mueller & Peter Murrell, 1986. "Interest groups and the size of government," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 48(2), pages 125-145, January.
    11. Niklas Potrafke, 2012. "Political cycles and economic performance in OECD countries: empirical evidence from 1951–2006," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 150(1), pages 155-179, January.
    12. Alesina, Alberto & La Ferrara, Eliana, 2005. "Preferences for redistribution in the land of opportunities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(5-6), pages 897-931, June.
    13. Thomas A. Garrett & Andrew F. Kozak & Russell M. Rhine, 2010. "Institutions and government growth: a comparison of the 1890s and the 1930s," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 92(Mar), pages 109-120.
    14. Michael Keen, 1997. "Peculiar institutions: A British perspective on tax policy in the United States," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 18(4), pages 371-400, November.
    15. Micael Castanheira & Gaëtan Nicodème & Paola Profeta, 2012. "On the political economics of tax reforms: survey and empirical assessment," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 19(4), pages 598-624, August.
    16. Lejour, A.M., 1995. "Cooperative and competitive policies in the EU : The European Siamese twin?," Other publications TiSEM 173fdc37-cf0b-46b8-b132-b, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    17. Tiago V. de V. Cavalcanti & Jose Tavares, 2003. "Women prefer larger governments: female labor supply and public spending," Nova SBE Working Paper Series wp433, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Nova School of Business and Economics.
    18. Jorge Martinez-Vazquez, 2001. "The Impact of Budgets on the Poor: Tax and Benefit," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper0110, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    19. Giorgio Brosio & Carla Marchese, 1988. "The Growth of Government under Different Redistributive Rules: A Long Term Study of the Italian Case," Public Finance Review, , vol. 16(4), pages 439-463, October.
    20. Mehrdad Vahabi & Philippe Batifoulier & Nicolas Silva, 2020. "A theory of predatory welfare state and citizen welfare: the French case," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 182(3), pages 243-271, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Public Choice; Political Business Cycle; Median Voter;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H11 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • P16 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Capitalist Institutions; Welfare State

    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:pra:mprapa:19835. 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: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.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.