The Good Polity: Normative Analysis of the State

This volume presents a set of new essays by leading economists, philosophers and political scientists concerned with the normative underpinnings of the state. "The Good Polity" is devoted to the analysis of detailed substantive issues arising within the normative theory of the state rather than with the exegesis of received views or the polemical statement of alternative positions. The essays are grouped around the themes of democracy, contract and compliance, and the responsibility of the state. Each author provides a detailed and freestanding examination of one aspect of the normative analysis of the state, and the resulting collection clearly displays the growing interaction between academic disciplines. The editors provide an introduction which sets out the analytic prerequisites for the normative theory of the state. The contributors are: Geoffrey Brennan, Joshua Cohen, Partha Dasgupta, Robert Goodin, Alan Hamlin, Russell Hardin, Philip Pettit, Robert Sugden, Albert Weale.

Alan Hamlin is Lecturer in Economics at the University of Southampton and author of Ethics, Economics and the State.

Philip Pettit is Professorial Fellow in teh Research School of Social Sciences at Australian National University. He is a General Editor of Basil Blackwell's Philosophical Theory series, author of Judging Justice and co-author of Semantics in Social Science.