Classical liberalism entails not only a theory about the scope of government and its relationship with the market but also a distinct view about how government should operate within its proper domain of public choices in non-market settings. Building on the political economy principles underpinning the works of diverse authors such as Friedrich Hayek, James Buchanan and Vincent and Elinor Ostrom, this book challenges the technocratic-epistocratic perspective in which social goals are defined by an aggregated social function and experts simply provide the means to attain them. The authors argue that individualism, freedom of choice, and freedom of association have deep implications on how we design, manage and assess our public governance arrangements. The book examines the knowledge and incentive problems associated with bureaucratic public administration while contrasting it with democratic governance. Aligica, Boettke, and Tarko argue that the focus should be on the diversity of opinions in any society regarding "what should be done" and on the design of democratic and polycentric institutions capable of limiting social conflicts and satisfying the preferences of as many people as possible. They thus fill a large gap in the literature, the public discourse, and the ways decision makers understand the nature and administration of the public sector.

Public Governance and the Classical-Liberal Perspective: Political Economy Foundations

Business & Money

Boettke, Peter J.

Aligica, Paul Dragos

Tarko, Vlad

Economics

Oxford University Press

Elinor Ostrom, co-recipient of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Economics, argued that we should not be limited to the conceptions of order derived from the work of Adam Smith and Thomas Hobbes when studying social order. She maintained that we should not limit ourselves to the theoretical frameworks of "The State" and "The Market." Instead, we need approaches that match the extensive variety of institutional arrangements existent in the world. In this book, Paul Dragos Aligica discusses some of the most challenging ideas emerging out of the research program on institutional diversity associated with Ostrom and her associates. He outlines a set of new research directions and an original interpretation of the significance and future of this program.

Institutional Diversity and Political Economy: The Ostroms and Beyond

Challenging Institutional Analysis and Development: The Bloomington School

Challenging Institutional Analysis and Development demonstrates the importance of one of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Economics winners Elinor Ostrom's research program. The Bloomington School has become one of the most dynamic, well recognized and productive centers of the New Institutional Theory movement. Its ascendancy is considered to be the result of a unique and extremely successful combination of interdisciplinary theoretical approaches and hard-nosed empiricism. This book demonstrates that the well-known interdisciplinary and empirical agenda of the Bloomington Research Program is the result of a less-known but very bold proposition: an attempt to revitalize and extend into the new millennium a traditional mode of analysis illustrated by authors like Locke, Montesquieu, Hume, Adam Smith, Hamilton, Madison and Tocqueville. As such, the School tries to synthesize the traditional perspectives with the contemporary developments in social sciences and thus to re-ignite the old approach in the new intellectual and political context of the twentieth century. The book presents an outline and a systematic analysis of the vision behind the Bloomington Research Program in Institutional Analysis and Development, explaining its basic assumptions and its main themes as well as the foundational philosophy that frames its research questions and theoretical and methodological approaches. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of social science, especially those in the fields of economics, political sciences, sociology and public administration.

Challenging Institutional Analysis and Development

Reference

Routledge

The Essential Herman Kahn: In Defense of Thinking

The Essential Herman Kahn offers the public for the first time an anthology consisting of the best of Herman Kahn's work. It brings together, out of the several thousands of pages published in his life, the 'essential Kahn' the most relevant, consequential, and interesting themes, ideas, and arguments of his work in areas such as international relations, public policy, environmentalism, strategic thinking, and futurology.

History

Lexington Books

This book focuses on the alternative paradigm, the pro-growth intellectual tradition that rejected the prophecies of doom and called for realism and pragmatism in dealing with the challenge of the future. Paul Dragos Aligica reconstructs and describes the basic elements of this tradition that emerged in the seventies as a response to the Club of Rome and the "limits to growth" movement. He outlines a comprehensive perspective on its methodological and conceptual foundations. Aligica uses the work of the two major founders of this alternative approach: Herman Kahn and Julian Simon. Herman Kahn was the first scholar and public intellectual to engage and refute the "doomsday" theses advanced by the Club of Rome and its followers. In his spirited and optimistic arguments he made a strong case for the feasibility, desirability and morality of global economic growth arguing that even given all the likely human, environmental, and material costs and risks, "the case is close to if not fully overwhelming." Julian Simon elaborated the "anti-doomsayers" lines opened by Kahn, further developing the emerging paradigm. He articulated new and precise arguments on issues such as population growth, natural resources scarcity and technological change, and reinforced Kahn's thesis that continued world economic development is a moral imperative as well as a practical desideratum. Together, Kahn and Simon managed to build the foundations on which rest the current counter-reaction to the "limits to growth" rhetoric and its initiatives. Both were not only public figures of great accomplishments and influence but also remarkable thinkers and personalities.

Prophecies of Doom and Scenarios of Progress: Herman Kahn, Julian Simon, and the Prospective Imagination

Politics & Social Sciences

Philosophy

Continuum

Public Entrepreneurship, Citizenship, and Self-Governance (Cambridge Studies in Economics, Choice, and Society)

In this book Paul Dragos Aligica revisits the theory of political self-governance in the context of recent developments in behavioral economics and political philosophy that have challenged the foundations of this theory. Building on the work of the 'Bloomington School' created by Nobel Laureate Elinor Ostrom and Public Choice political economy co-founder Vincent Ostrom, Aligica presents a fresh conceptualization of the key processes at the core of democratic-liberal governance systems involving civic competence and public entrepreneurship. The result is not only a re-assessment and re-articulation of the theories constructed by the Bloomington School of Public Choice, but also a new approach to several cutting-edge discussions relevant to governance studies and applied institutional theory, such as the debates generated by the recent waves of populism, paternalism and authoritarianism.

Cambridge University Press

Capitalist Alternatives: Models, Taxonomies, Scenarios (Routledge Advances in International Political Economy)

The book's objective is to explore the challenge of thinking methodically - in a theoretically and empirically informed way - about alternative forms of capitalism. What are the most effective ways to conceptualize the existing models of capitalism that have captured the public imagination and are currently floating around in the public debate? How can one mobilize empirical analysis and theory in thinking about the realm of possibilities and about the future of economic order, but avoid the twin perils of scientism and historicism? This book is an attempt to respond to these and related challenges.  First, it delves into the substantive aspect of the debate, taking a closer look at a set of particular forms and models of capitalism that are currently discussed both in mass media and in academic circles as plausible, or at least possible, alternatives to the status quo: Crony, State, Regulatory, and Entrepreneurial Capitalisms. By elaborating and clarifying those models, it engages in a heuristic exercise that leads to a better understanding of the task of conceptualizing and assessing, in a theoretically informed way, the diversity of forms of capitalism.  Second, the book takes a step further, looking at the epistemic, theoretical and methodological dimensions of the discussion: What is involved, more precisely, in our classifying and theorizing of capitalist systems and their historical evolution? What is the epistemic basis for building plausible conjectures about the future evolution of an economic system? What are the logical and methodological parameters of our endeavors that deal with economic systems, or with the problem of continuity and change in comparative economic systems? Offering an original approach to the problem of alternative forms of capitalism, this book will be of great interest to scholars working in the field of comparative political economy.

The book's objective is to explore the challenge of thinking methodically - in a theoretically and empirically informed way - about alternative forms of capitalism. What are the most effective ways to conceptualize the existing models of capitalism that have captured the public imagination and are currently floating around in the public debate? How can one mobilize empirical analysis and theory in thinking about the realm of possibilities and about the future of economic order, but avoid the twin perils of scientism and historicism? This book is an attempt to respond to these and related challenges. First, it delves into the substantive aspect of the debate, taking a closer look at a set of particular forms and models of capitalism that are currently discussed both in mass media and in academic circles as plausible, or at least possible, alternatives to the status quo: Crony, State, Regulatory, and Entrepreneurial Capitalisms. By elaborating and clarifying those models, it engages in a heuristic exercise that leads to a better understanding of the task of conceptualizing and assessing, in a theoretically informed way, the diversity of forms of capitalism. Second, the book takes a step further, looking at the epistemic, theoretical and methodological dimensions of the discussion: What is involved, more precisely, in our classifying and theorizing of capitalist systems and their historical evolution? What is the epistemic basis for building plausible conjectures about the future evolution of an economic system? What are the logical and methodological parameters of our endeavors that deal with economic systems, or with the problem of continuity and change in comparative economic systems? Offering an original approach to the problem of alternative forms of capitalism, this book will be of great interest to scholars working in the field of comparative political economy.

In this book Paul Dragos Aligica revisits the theory of political self-governance in the context of recent developments in behavioral economics and political philosophy that have challenged the foundations of this theory. Building on the work of the 'Bloomington School' created by Nobel Laureate Elinor Ostrom and Public Choice political economy co-founder Vincent Ostrom, Aligica presents a fresh conceptualization of the key processes at the core of democratic-liberal governance systems involving civic competence and public entrepreneurship. The result is not only a re-assessment and re-articulation of the theories constructed by the Bloomington School of Public Choice, but also a new approach to several cutting-edge discussions relevant to governance studies and applied institutional theory, such as the debates generated by the recent waves of populism, paternalism and authoritarianism.

How do we conceptualize and theorize about the social organization of ideology? How should we think methodically—in theoretically and empirically informed ways—about the institutionalization of indoctrination and propaganda? How should we approach the study of the social and political instrumentation of ideology in regimes that assume that historical missions of messianic social change are the stringent organizing and legitimization principles of their very existence? This book is an attempt to answer these questions.\nOn the one hand, this book explores key elements of conceptualization and theoretical framing of the phenomena associated with the institutionalization of indoctrination. New potential venues of theoretical elaboration are identified, and in several cases, these venues are tentatively engaged. On the other hand, this book balances the exploratory theoretical approach with an exploratory historical investigation. Concentrating on the case study of Communist Romania, this book charts various facets of the institutionalization of the “political-ideological commissars” in the education system, while tracking their evolution. The two dimensions of the book offer, in conjunction, a contribution to our understanding of the institutional arrangements of indoctrination and their associated social monitoring and control practices, as well as to our awareness regarding their avatars, as manifested in recent history.

The Institutionalization of Indoctrination: An Exploratory Investigation based on the Romanian Case Study

Preda, Simona

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Aligica, Paul Dragos. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Aligica, Paul Dragos

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Aligica, Paul Dragos. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Public Governance and the Classical-Liberal Perspective: Political Economy Foundations

Institutional Diversity and Political Economy: The Ostroms and Beyond

Challenging Institutional Analysis and Development

The Essential Herman Kahn: In Defense of Thinking

Prophecies of Doom and Scenarios of Progress: Herman Kahn, Julian Simon, and the Prospective Imagination

Public Entrepreneurship, Citizenship, and Self-Governance (Cambridge Studies in Economics, Choice, and Society)

Capitalist Alternatives: Models, Taxonomies, Scenarios (Routledge Advances in International Political Economy)

Capitalist Alternatives: Models, Taxonomies, Scenarios (Routledge Advances in International Political Economy)

Public Entrepreneurship, Citizenship, and Self-Governance (Cambridge Studies in Economics, Choice, and Society)

The Institutionalization of Indoctrination: An Exploratory Investigation based on the Romanian Case Study