Austrian Law And Economics 1

The original contributions to the Research Handbook provide an introduction to the application of Austrian economics to law. The book begins with chapters on the methodology of law and economics. Further chapters discuss key concepts in Austrian economics – dynamic competitive processes, spontaneous order, subjective value, entrepreneurship, and the limited nature of individual knowledge – as they relate to topics in evolutionary law (social rules, self-governance, dispute resolution) and basic law (torts, antitrust, civil procedure, business and family law).

The use of economics to study law was pioneered by the Austrian School of Economics. The nineteenth century founders of the school believed that economics could contribute to understanding the spontaneous development of common law as well as the nature of legal rights. For this insightful research review Mario Rizzo has selected key papers from today's vibrant Austrian School, focusing on the study of property, market-chosen law, slippery-slope analysis, entrepreneurship, institutions, decentralized social knowledge, and the evolution of legal institutions. This title represents the cutting-edge Austrian contributions to economics and will be an essential reference source for both students and researchers.

The Austrian School of Economics is an intellectual tradition in economics and political economy dating back to Carl Menger in the late-19th century. Menger stressed the subjective nature of value in the individual decision calculus. Individual choices are indeed made on the margin, but the evaluations of rank ordering of ends sought in the act of choice are subjective to individual chooser. For Menger, the economic calculus was about scarce means being deployed to pursue an individual's highest valued ends. The act of choice is guided by subjective assessments of the individual, and is open ended as the individual is constantly discovering what ends to pursue, and learning the most effective way to use the means available to satisfy those ends. This school of economic thinking spread outside of Austria to the rest of Europe and the United States in the early-20th century and continued to develop and gain followers, establishing itself as a major stream of heterodox economics. The Oxford Handbook of Austrian Economics provides an overview of this school and its theories. The various contributions discussed in this book all reflect a tension between the Austrian School's orthodox argumentative structure (rational choice and invisible hand) and its addressing of a heterodox problem situations (uncertainty, differential knowledge, ceaseless change). The Austrian economists from the founders to today seek to derive the invisible hand theorem from the rational choice postulate via institutional analysis in a persistent and consistent manner. Scholars and students working in the field of History of Economic Thought, those following heterodox approaches, and those both familiar with the Austrian School or looking to learn more will find much to learn in this comprehensive volume.

For most economists, ‘Austrian economics’ refers to a distinct school of thought, originating with Mises and Hayek and characterised by a strong commitment to free-market liberalism. This innovative book explores an alternative Austrian tradition in economics. Demonstrating how the debate on the economics of socialism began in Austria long before the 1930s, it analyses the work and impact of many leading Austrian economists through a century of Austrian socialist economics.

Presenting a concise overview of the post-war decline in popularity of the Austrian school of economics and its subsequent revival in the late twentieth century, this updated second edition offers a theoretical and historical introduction to the ideas of the Austrian school and its intellectually distinguishing qualities. This Advanced Introduction considers the field’s key originators and proponents and reflects on the acceleration in interest in the last two decades.

The economic analysis of legal and regulatory issues need not be limited to the neoclassical economic approach. The expert contributors to this work employ a variety of heterodox legal-economic theories to address a broad range of legal issues. They demonstrate how these various approaches can lead to very different conclusions concerning the role of the law and legal intervention in a wide array of contexts. The schools of thought and methodologies represented here include institutional economics, new institutional economics, socio-economics, social economics, behavioral economics, game theory, feminist economics, Rawlsian economics, radical economics, Austrian economics, and personalist economics. The legal and regulatory issues examined include anti-trust and competition, corporate governance, the environment and natural resources, land use and property rights, unions and collective bargaining, welfare benefits, work-time regulation and standards, sexual harassment in the workplace, obligations of employers and employees to each other, crime, torts, and even the structure of government. Each contributor brings a different emphasis and provides thoughtful, sometimes provocative analysis and conclusions. Together, these heterodox insights will provide valuable supplementary reading for courses in law and economics as well as public policy and business courses at both the graduate and undergraduate levels.

Israel Kirzner, a former student of Ludwig von Mises, looks at the influences of the economic debates in Europe on von Mises' thought, traces his theories as they developed in his writings, and discusses both critical and supportive commentators on von Mises.

What if economics began with people? Choice is an essential feature of the human condition. Every time we embark on a given plan of action, big or small, we make a choice. Whereas many economists model people’s behavior using idealized assumptions, economists of the Austrian School don’t. The Austrian School of Economics takes people as they are and constructs economic theories by examining the logical structure of the choices they make. Austrian Economics: An Introduction book explains the Austrian School’s insights on a wide range of economic topics and introduces some of its key thinkers. It also explains the relationship between the Austrian School and mainstream economics and delves into the criticisms that Austrian School economists have mounted against communist and socialist economic thought.