Overview

This book brings together a number of articles, for the most part already pub­ lished, that develop a contemporary institutionalist approach to the study of the economic role of government. The institutionalist tradition in these matters began with the work of Henry Carter Adams on economics and jurisprudence! and Richard T. Ely on the relation of the institutions of property and contract 2 to the distribution of wealth. It continued with John R. Commons's monu­ 3 mental analytical and historical study of the legal foundations of capitalism, Edwin E. Witte's work on the role of government in the economy,4 and Ken­ s neth Parson's study of economic developmenL The approach to law and economics that is developed in this book centers on (1) an identification of the objective fundamentals of the interrelations between legal and economic pro· cesses and (2) the development of skills with which to analyze and predict the performance consequences of alternative institutional designs. We must stress that our principal goal is quite simply to understand what is going on-to identify the instrumental variables and fundamental issues and processes-in the operation of legal institutions of economic significance. We envision government as an object of legal control. We also see law as an instrument of securing economic gain and advantage-that is, as a wealth­ producing and -acquiring alternative.

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