The Selected Works Of Gordon Tullock (10-Volume Set) - Hardcover

Tullock, Gordon

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0865975302 ISBN 13: 9780865975309

Publisher: Liberty Fund, 2006

Synopsis

During the past half-century Gordon Tullock has continually advanced the frontiers of political economy, most particularly with respect to the workings of representative democracies and autocracies. As his reputation grows, Liberty Fund announces a ten-volume collection, The Selected Works of Gordon Tullock. This series, edited and arranged thematically by George Mason University’s Duncan Black Professor of Economics Charles K. Rowley, brings together Tullock’s most significant contributions to economics, political science, public choice, sociology, law and economics, and bioeconomics.

Tullock followed a unique path in his academic career. His exposure to formal economic training was limited to one course taught by Henry Simons as part of the law curriculum at the University of Chicago. Although Tullock does not hold a degree in economics, he is one of the most respected and widely cited economists of the modern age. His influence on modern political economy is simply immense. As Rowley points out in his introduction to the first volume of this series, “Gordon Tullock is an economist by nature rather than by training.” Assuredly, his “outsider” perspective and his intellectual brilliance cultivate an uncommon ability to think “outside the box” and to explain scientifically phenomena that are often intuitively obvious but not readily demonstrated.

Tullock and his 1962 coauthor, Nobel laureate James M. Buchanan, are widely recognized as cofounders of public choice, a field that systematically applies the rational choice approach of economics to the analysis of political markets. Public choice analysts evaluate the impact on political outcomes exercised by voters, special interests, bureaucrats, legislators, and presidents on the assumption that each such actor pursues his own self-interest. In so doing, public choice demonstrates that the “invisible hand,” identified by Adam Smith as associating self-interest in the private marketplace with the wealth of a nation, does not necessarily hold in political markets, where the “visible boot” of government, unless carefully checked, may result in economic ruin.

Tullock has made pathbreaking contributions to constitutional political economy, the vote motive, rent-seeking theory, bureaucracy, law and economics, and bioeconomics. He has expanded the frontiers of political economy, widely defined.

Scholars will undoubtedly find the extensive breadth and depth of Tullock’s writings enriching. The general reader, as well as the student of politics, and all who love economic liberty, will find Tullock’s prose lucid, readable, and sprinkled with wit. His forensic argument is penetrating, compelling, clear, and unambiguous. His brilliant mind is surprisingly accessible to us all.

Gordon Tullock is among a small group of living legends in the field of political economics. The Selected Works of Gordon Tullock provides an entree to the mind of an original thinker. Professor Rowley provides deliberately sparse contextual introduction to each volume, opting to allow the very able and eloquent Tullock to speak for himself.

Charles K. Rowley is Duncan Black Professor of Economics 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.

About this title

About the Author

Gordon Tullock is a professor of law and economics at George Mason University.

Edition details

• Publisher: Liberty Fund
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 0865975302
• ISBN 13: 9780865975309
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 4220
• Editor: Rowley Charles K.