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Book part
Publication date: 23 July 2016

Romance or No Romance? Adam Smith and David Hume in James Buchanan’s “Politics without Romance”

Andrew Farrant and Maria Pia Paganelli

Can we model politics as exclusively based on self-interest, leaving virtue aside? How much romance is there in the study of politics? We show that James Buchanan, a…

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Abstract

Can we model politics as exclusively based on self-interest, leaving virtue aside? How much romance is there in the study of politics? We show that James Buchanan, a founder of public choice and constitutional political economy, reintroduces a modicum of romance into politics, despite claiming that his work is the study of “politics without romance”: Buchanan’s model needs an ethical attitude to defend rules against rent-seeking.

We claim that Adam Smith, more than David Hume, should be considered one of the primary intellectual influences on Buchanan’s public choice and constitutional political economy. It is commonly believed that Hume assumes in politics every man ought to be considered a knave, making him an influence on Buchanan’s idea of politics without romance. Yet, it is Smith who, like Buchanan, describes rent-seeking and suggests that public virtues may be the remedy through which good rules maintaining liberty and prosperity can be generated and enforced. Smith, like Buchanan, rejects sole reliance on economic incentives: the study of politics needs some romance.

Details

Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology
Type: Book
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/S0743-41542016000034A013
ISBN: 978-1-78560-960-2

Keywords

  • James Buchanan
  • David Hume
  • Adam Smith
  • benevolence
  • constitutions

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Book part
Publication date: 19 August 2019

James M. Buchanan and Democratic Classical Liberalism

David Ellerman

Nancy MacLean’s book, Democracy in Chains, raised questions about James M. Buchanan’s commitment to democracy. This chapter investigates the relationship of classical…

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Nancy MacLean’s book, Democracy in Chains, raised questions about James M. Buchanan’s commitment to democracy. This chapter investigates the relationship of classical liberalism in general and of Buchanan in particular to democratic theory. Contrary to the simplistic classical liberal juxtaposition of “coercion vs. consent,” there have been from Antiquity onward voluntary contractarian defenses of non-democratic government and even slavery – all little noticed by classical liberal scholars who prefer to think of democracy as just “government by the consent of the governed” and slavery as being inherently coercive. Historically, democratic theory had to go beyond that simplistic notion of democracy to develop a critique of consent-based non-democratic government, for example, the Hobbesian pactum subjectionis. That critique was based firstly on the distinction between contracts or constitutions of alienation (translatio) versus delegation (concessio). Then, the contracts of alienation were ruled out based on the theory of inalienable rights that descends from the reformation doctrine of inalienability of conscience down through the Enlightenment to modern times in the abolitionist and democratic movements. While he developed no theory of inalienability, the mature Buchanan explicitly allowed only a constitution of delegation, contrary to many modern classical liberals or libertarians who consider the choice between consent-based democratic or non-democratic governments (e.g., private cities or shareholder states) to be a pragmatic one. But Buchanan seems to not even realize that his at-most delegation dictum would also rule out the employer–employee or human rental contract which is a contract of alienation “within the scope of the employment.”

Details

Including a Symposium on Ludwig Lachmann
Type: Book
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/S0743-41542019000037B017
ISBN: 978-1-78769-862-8

Keywords

  • Buchanan
  • non-democratic classical liberalism
  • contractual defenses of slavery and autocracy
  • alienation vs delegation contracts
  • inalienable rights
  • Nancy MacLean

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Case study
Publication date: 29 November 2019

What to do when your brand gets kidnapped by Narcos: the case of Buchanan’s whisky

Nicolas Kervyn, Judith Cavazos Arroyo, Fernando Rey Castillo Villar and Rosa Andrea Gomez Zuñiga

Learning outcomes are as follows: understanding the difference between brand identity and brand image; applying various segmentation tools; understanding the appeal of the…

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Teaching notes available

Abstract

Learning outcomes

Learning outcomes are as follows: understanding the difference between brand identity and brand image; applying various segmentation tools; understanding the appeal of the aspirational brand and its consequence on private and public consumption; exploring the strategic options available to a brand facing a brand appropriation; exploring the pros and cons of opposing a brand appropriation; and developing a plan for the implementation of this strategy.

Case overview/synopsis

This case will help students understand the difference between the brand identity that the brand owners intend and the brand image that consumers actually perceive.

Complexity academic level

This case is designed to be used in marketing management, brand strategy or consumer culture course. Specifically, the case is designed for college seniors or master students with basic strategic marketing training. It should provide the basis of discussions on the topics of brand management, consumer culture, brand portfolio management, international marketing, repositioning strategy, brand architecture, brand equity, brand assets, brand appropriation and consumer relationships with brands.

Supplementary materials

Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

Subject code

CSS 8: Marketing

Details

Emerald Emerging Markets Case Studies, vol. 9 no. 3
Type: Case Study
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/EEMCS-07-2019-0198
ISSN: 2045-0621

Keywords

  • Marketing
  • Consumer behaviour
  • Brand management/equity

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Book part
Publication date: 30 November 2016

Constitutionalism, Federalism, and Limited Government: Hayekian Arguments in Political Scientists’ Perspective

Viktor J. Vanberg

The notion of constitutionalism and federalism as principal devices for limiting the power of government is central to F. A. Hayek’s political philosophy. A number of…

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Abstract

The notion of constitutionalism and federalism as principal devices for limiting the power of government is central to F. A. Hayek’s political philosophy. A number of political scientists have recently criticized Hayek’s (as well as J. M. Buchanan’s and B. R. Weingast’s) reasoning on this subject for its presumed “neoliberal bias.” This paper reviews this critique and takes it as a challenge to clarify certain ambiguities in Hayek’s – and, more generally, in liberal – accounts of constitutionalism and federalism.

Details

Revisiting Hayek’s Political Economy
Type: Book
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/S1529-213420160000021004
ISBN: 978-1-78560-988-6

Keywords

  • Constitutionalism
  • federalism
  • limited government

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Article
Publication date: 1 March 1990

NORMATIVE AND POSITIVE KNOWLEDGE IN POLITICAL ECONOMY: NEW ANSWERS TO OLD QUESTIONS?

Volker Nienhaus

1. Reason as the Source of Knowledge For medieval men, the existence of a personal and acting God was beyond any doubt. They were convinced that God intervenes into and…

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Abstract

1. Reason as the Source of Knowledge For medieval men, the existence of a personal and acting God was beyond any doubt. They were convinced that God intervenes into and interferes with the course of the world. The acting of God was a main factor for the explanation of natural phenomena. But with the passing of time, the understanding of nature improved and more and more phenomena could be explained by appeal to reason only and without recourse to actions of God. It became the general opinion that natural phenomena are subject to invariable natural laws. This clear departure from the God‐related understanding of nature happened when modern philosophy emerged in the 17th and 18th century. This modern philosophy saw nature as a mechanic construction. One of the leading philosophers of that period, Rene Descartes, argued that the laws of mechanics are the laws of nature. Descartes, the founder of rationalistic philosophy, was no atheist, but when he referred to God, it was only to become sure that what is clear (and rational) is also true.

Details

Humanomics, vol. 6 no. 3
Type: Research Article
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/eb006107
ISSN: 0828-8666

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Book part
Publication date: 19 August 2019

The Allure and Tragedy of Ideological Blinders Left, Right, and Center: A Review Essay of Nancy MacLean’s Democracy in Chains ☆

Peter J. Boettke

Nancy Maclean’s Democracy in Chains (2017) is an attempt to provide a narrative arc for the rise of free market ideas in political action during the second half of the…

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Abstract

Nancy Maclean’s Democracy in Chains (2017) is an attempt to provide a narrative arc for the rise of free market ideas in political action during the second half of the twentieth century and into the first decades of the twenty-first century. The central character in her narrative is neither F.A. Hayek nor Milton Friedman, let alone Adam Smith or Ludwig von Mises, but James M. Buchanan, the 1986 Nobel Prize winner in economics. MacLean argues that rather than extol the virtues of the market economy as Hayek and Friedman did before him, Buchanan focused on the dysfunctions of politics. Due to a series of argumentative fallacies and failures that follow from her ideological blinders, I argue that MacLean’s attempt is a missed opportunity to seriously engage some very pressing issues in public choice and political economy and understand how James Buchanan attempted to resolve them in a democratic manner. As such, Democracy in Chains is not only a mischaracterization of Buchanan and his project but also a poignant lesson to us all about how ideological blinders can subvert even the sincerest effort to unearth truth in the social sciences and the humanities.

Details

Including a Symposium on Ludwig Lachmann
Type: Book
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/S0743-41542019000037B016
ISBN: 978-1-78769-862-8

Keywords

  • Democracy in Chains
  • James Buchanan
  • Nancy MacLean
  • public choice
  • political economy
  • institutions and archive
  • B31
  • H11
  • Y3

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Book part
Publication date: 19 August 2019

Reading the Hermeneutics of Suspicion with Suspicion: A Review Essay on Nancy MacLean’s Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America ☆

Ross B. Emmett

A review of Nancy MacLean’s Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America focuses on the implications of her historiographic method…

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Abstract

A review of Nancy MacLean’s Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America focuses on the implications of her historiographic method in reading Jim Buchanan’s work and the resulting failure to take seriously the underlying framework of constitutional political economy that informed both Jim Buchanan’s and Frank H. Knight’s work. MacLean’s historiography is that of social movement history, which sublimates the interests and motivations of the individual to that of the movement. The real scholar disappears into simply an agent of the movement’s master plan. Because MacLean is suspicious of the movement she believes Buchanan to be part of, his work is interpreted solely in light of what she assumes to be the master plan. In particular, she ignores Buchanan’s habit of returning to key themes in order to develop new modes of analysis. MacLean focuses solely on his public choice work, ignoring the latter developments of constitutional economics and even moral order.

Two issues in MacLean’s account are the focus on the review. The first is simply a research mistake that she drew unwarranted conclusions from regarding Buchanan’s connection to the “massive resistance” movement against desegregation of Virginia public schools. The second issue reveals MacLean’s unwillingness to consider the changes in Buchanan’s scholarship over his career. Taken together, the issues indicate that she refused to read Buchanan on his own terms in order to understand the progress of his work, even if she disagreed with him at the end.

Details

Including a Symposium on Ludwig Lachmann
Type: Book
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/S0743-41542019000037B018
ISBN: 978-1-78769-862-8

Keywords

  • Social movement historiography
  • James M. Buchanan
  • Frank H. Knight
  • constitutional democracy
  • Abram Harris
  • desegregation

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Book part
Publication date: 19 August 2019

Poking a Hornets’ Nest: The Debate on Democracy in Chains ☆

Gary Mongiovi

In Democracy in Chains, Nancy MacLean draws attention to the influence that James M. Buchanan’s work has had on the political economic discourse of the past half century…

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Abstract

In Democracy in Chains, Nancy MacLean draws attention to the influence that James M. Buchanan’s work has had on the political economic discourse of the past half century. Buchanan and his collaborators in the Virginia Political Economy tradition have provided intellectual firepower for efforts to delegitimize democratically sanctioned policies aimed at alleviating the dysfunctional consequences of market activity. While MacLean’s account contains some well-documented inaccuracies, her characterization of Buchanan’s agenda is broadly accurate. This chapter assesses Buchanan’s economics in light of the themes raised by MacLean. His work, we shall argue, is a modern manifestation of what Marx termed “vulgar economy,” that is, ruling-class ideology posing as science.

Details

Including a Symposium on Ludwig Lachmann
Type: Book
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/S0743-41542019000037B020
ISBN: 978-1-78769-862-8

Keywords

  • Buchanan
  • MacLean
  • classical liberalism
  • vulgar economics
  • Virginia political economy tradition
  • democracy and capitalism

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Article
Publication date: 1 November 1994

Buchanan on Cost and Health

David A. Reisman

Discusses James Buchanan′s contribution to the important topic ofcost‐containment in the area of health care. Historical and ideationalin its thrust, it seeks also to make…

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Discusses James Buchanan′s contribution to the important topic of cost‐containment in the area of health care. Historical and ideational in its thrust, it seeks also to make a more general contribution by showing how the methodology of public choice can be applied to a specific issue in economic and social policy. Examines the precise body of theory which Buchanan brings to bear when attempting a politico‐economic calculus of consent. Considers the causes of the rise in the cost of health and assesses Buchanan′s anxieties in respect of the burden. Discusses Buchanan′s solutions and explores alternatives to the options he endorses. Concludes that Buchanan′s answers may not appeal to all readers, but they are a fruitful area of research and speculation.

Details

International Journal of Social Economics, vol. 21 no. 9
Type: Research Article
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/03068299410070399
ISSN: 0306-8293

Keywords

  • Central government
  • Costs
  • Economy
  • Health care
  • History
  • Policy
  • Politics
  • Social economics

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Article
Publication date: 5 October 2012

James Buchanan on inheritance: a critique

Walter Block

What are the reasons for writing this paper? The purpose of this paper is to make the case for liberty, and free enterprise, against the criticisms of this system…

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Abstract

Purpose

What are the reasons for writing this paper? The purpose of this paper is to make the case for liberty, and free enterprise, against the criticisms of this system. Specifically, the present essay is an attempt to criticize the case for inheritance taxation. This is made by many, but the author focuses on James Buchanan's contribution to this support for socialism. The author does so because James Buchanan is widely known as a champion of capitalism and free markets, and he is nothing of the sort, at least in this one case.

Design/methodology/approach

The approach used in this paper is to quote widely from the adherents of inheritance taxes, and then to show the flaws in the cases they offer in support of this system.

Findings

The finding is that none of the arguments offered on behalf of inheritance taxation have been shown to be valid. There are flaws in all of them. This, of course, does not imply no such arguments can be shown to be successful; only that the ones herein cited do not justify this market interference.

Social implications

Why do entrepreneurs engage in entrepreneurship? For a whole host of reasons, surely; these might in the extreme be as different as there are different entrepreneurs. But one motivation, certainly an important one, likely to be felt by most entrepreneurs, is to leave a bequest upon demise, so that one's heirs and loved ones may share in the fruits of one's entrepreneurial activities. Thus, taxes on inheritances, let alone those approaching the 100 percent level, must be anathema to at least most if not all entrepreneurial activities. The present paper makes the case against such attacks on wealth, bequests, inheritances.

Originality/value

To the best of the author's knowledge, although there are of course defenses of bequests, and critiques of Buchanan on other matters, there are no criticisms of this Nobel prize winning economist on this particular issue.

Details

Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy, vol. 1 no. 2
Type: Research Article
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/20452101211261435
ISSN: 2045-2101

Keywords

  • Entrepreneurship
  • Inheritance
  • Incentives
  • Entrepreneurialism
  • Inheritance tax

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