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Foreign Rights: Available Now: EconomicsCarbon Strategies by Andrew J. Hoffman Changing Paths edited by Peter P. Houtzager and Mick Moore The Cult of Statistical Significance by Stephen T. Ziliak and Deirdre N. McCloskey Helping People Help Themselves by David Ellerman Imperfect Institutions by Thráinn Eggertsson In Defense of Monopoly by Richard McKenzie and Dwight Lee Institutions and Economic Theory by Eirik G. Furubotn and Rudolf Richter Integrity and Agreement by Lanse Minkler Markets and Cultural Voices by Tyler Cowen The Street Porter and the Philosopher by Sandra J. Peart and David M. Levy The "Vanity of the Philosopher" by David M. Levy and Sandra J. Peart Carbon Strategies: How Leading Companies are Reducing their Climate Change FootprintAndrew J. Hoffman Rights: World Carbon Strategies describes specific steps any business can take to implement sound, practical climate-related corporate policies. Based on Andrew J. Hoffman's widely-praised report from the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, and significantly revised in light of sequent developments, Carbon Strategies teaches practitioners and students about the importance of timing policy implementations; establishing appropriate levels of internal and external commitment; influencing beneficial policy development; and creating new business opportunities based on climate policy. Hoffman presents real-life "lessons learned" at each step of the climate-strategy development process, and concludes this concise guidebook with seven case studies (Cinergy, Swiss Re, DuPont, Alcoa, Shell Group, and Whirlpool) that demonstrate the principles of corporate climate policymaking in action. Andrew J. Hoffman is Holcim (US) Professor of Sustainable Enterprise at the University of Michigan; a position that holds joint appointments at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business and the School of Natural Resources & Environment. Within this role, Andy also serves as Associate Director of the Frederick A. and Barbara M. Erb Institute for Global Sustainable Enterprise. September 2007 Changing Paths: International Development and the New Politics of InclusionPeter P. Houtzager and Mick Moore, Editors Rights: World After two decades of marketizing, an array of national and international actors have become concerned with growing global inequality, the failure to reduce the numbers of very poor people in the world, and a perceived global backlash against international economic institutions. This new concern with poverty reduction and the political participation of excluded groups has set the stage for a new politics of inclusion within nations and in the international arena. The essays in this volume explore what forms the new politics of inclusion can take in low- and middle-income countries by using a polity-centered approach that focuses on the political capacities of societal and state actors to negotiate large-scale collective solutions and that highlights a variety of possible strategies to lift large numbers of people out of poverty and political subordination. The contributors suggest there is little basis for the radical polycentrism that colors so much contemporary development thought. They focus on how the political capabilities of different societal and state actors develop over time and how their development is influenced by state action and a variety of institutional and other factors. The final chapter draws insightful conclusions about the political limitations and opportunities presented by current international discourse on poverty. Peter P. Houtzager is Research Fellow, Institute of Development Studies (IDS), University of Sussex. Mick Moore is Professorial Fellow, Institute of Development Studies (IDS), University of Sussex. October 2003 The Cult of Statistical Significance: How the Standard Error Costs Us Jobs, Justice, and LivesStephen T. Ziliak and Deirdre N. McCloskey Rights: World "Statistical significance," a technique that dominates medicine, economics, psychology, and many other scientific fields, has been a dreadful mistake. The outcome is a case study in bad science—how it originates and how it grows. One would expect complex statistical methods to pass a test of basic common sense. "This pain relief pill is not lethal." Or "this tax policy improves the economy." Ziliak and McCloskey show that the most important statistical method used in many of the sciences—but not in the most progressive—doesn't. Progress in medicine and economics and other sciences has been brought to a halt by the test of "statistical" significance. These sciences, from agronomy to zoology, Ziliak and McCloskey have found, engage in ceremonies of "testing" that don't test and "estimating" that don't estimate. Heedless of magnitude and of a genuine engagement with alternative hypotheses, they "testimate." "Null hypothesis significance testing" is in other words a scientific train-wreck, about which a small group of statisticians have been warning for a century. The Cult of Statistical Significance shows field by field how the wreck happened, reports on the fatalities, and offers a quantitative way forward. Stephen Ziliak is Professor of Economics at Roosevelt University and working on a scientific biography of William Sealy Gosset (aka “Student”), the hero of this book. Deirdre McCloskey is Distinguished Professor of Economics, History, English, and Communication at the University of Illinois at Chicago. January 2008 Helping People Help Themselves: From the World Bank to an Alternative Philosophy of Development AssistanceDavid Ellerman Rights: World Beginning from the assertion that development assistance agencies are inherently structured to provide help that is ultimately unhelpful by overriding or undercutting the capacity of people to help themselves, David P. Ellerman argues that the best strategy for development is a drastic reduction in development assistance so that the locus of initiative can shift from the would-be helpers to the doers (often thought of as recipients) of development. He presents methods for doing this that he describes as indirect, enabling, and autonomy-respecting, drawn from the work of major thinkers in pedagogy, management theory, psychotherapy, community organizing, and community education. Among those thinkers are Albert Hirschman, Paulo Freire, John Dewey, and Søren Kierkegaard, who reach remarkably similar conclusions on the helper/doer problems and relationship. April 2005 *Indian subcontinent rights are not available. Imperfect Institutions: Possibilities and Limits of ReformThráinn Eggertsson Rights: World Institutional economics is an approach that makes use of a variety of social science disciplines to analyze economic, political, and social institutions and their effects on economic activity. Thráinn Eggertsson deals with the problem of why some countries remain poorer than others by looking at technologies-which many economists consider to be the driving force for sustained economic development. He contents that it is "social technology", that is, imperfect social and political institutions, that perpetuate the relative poverty of nations, and that different types of problems require different analytic methods, ranging from neoclassical approaches to evolutionary and knowledge-based approaches. One chapter takes Iceland as a case study to illustrate the poverty traps that result from imperfect institutions. Ultimately, Eggertsson argues that institutional economics needs to be more policy driven, and that policymakers in developing and transitional economies must use effective and specific institutional and social models if they are to succeed in encouraging and sustaining economic growth. Thráinn Eggertsson is Professor of Economics, University of Iceland. February 2005 In Defense of Monopoly: How Market Power Fosters Creative ProductionRichard McKenzie and Dwight Lee Rights: World A provocative defense of dominant corporate force, In Defense of Monopoly offers an unconventional but empirically-grounded argument in favor of market monopolies. Authors McKenzie and Lee claim that conventional, static models exaggerate the harm done by real-world monopolies, and show why some degree of monopoly presence is necessary to maximize the improvement of human welfare over time. Inspired by Joseph Schumpeter's suggestion that market imperfections can drive an economy's long-term progress, In Defense of Monopoly defies conventional assumptions to show readers why an economic system's failure to efficiently allocate its resources is actually a necessary precondition for maximizing the system's long-term performance: the perfectly fluid, competitive economy idealized by most economists is decidedly inferior to one characterized by market entry and exit restrictions or costs An economy is not a board game in which players compete for a limited number of properties; nor is it much like the kind of blackboard games that economists use to develop their monopoly models. As McKenzie and Lee demonstrate, the creation of goods and services in the real world requires not only competition, but the prospect of gains beyond a normal competitive rate of return. Richard McKenzie is the Walter B. Gerken Professor of Enterprise and Society in the Merage School of Business at the University of California, Irvine. Dwight Lee is the Bernard B. and Eugenia A. Ramsey Professor of Economics at the University of Georgia, Athens. December 2007 Institutions and Economic Theory: The Contribution of the New Institutional EconomicsEirik G. Furubotn and Rudolf Richter Rights: World During the time that has elapsed since the first edition of Institutions and Economic Theory appeared in 1997, economists and other social scientists have shown an ever increasing determination to explore the role institutions play in shaping economic and social behavior. One result of this growing interest and professional activity has been a notable increase in the flow of both theoretical and empirical literature in the area. The objective of the second edition is to continue the work of the first edition while explaining and assessing some of the major refinements, extensions, and useful applications that have been introduced into the body of neoinstitutionalist thought in recent years. Whatever indications the current literature may give about the future of neoinstitutionalism, it seems reasonable to say that, for the next decade or so, the main building blocks of the NIE will remain transaction-cost economics, property-rights analysis, and contract theory. These are the elements on which the revised version of the book focuses. The references have been updated. Parallel developments in the fields of economics sociology and its attacks on representatives of the NIE have been added. The overlap between the NIE and developments in economic history and political science has been supplemented. The institution-as-an-equilibrium-of-game approach, which is increasingly applied, is explained and taken into account. Spring 2005 Integrity and Agreement: Economics When Principles Also MatterLanse Minkler Rights: World Integrity and Agreement develops the notion of two different kinds of integrity. One focuses on identity-conferring commitments to principles (commitment-integrity), the other on preferences for principles (preference-integrity). But while they differ in their particulars, most fundamentally, both refer to honest behavior. The possibility of integrity and honest behavior is important any time there are economic agreements. That covers a lot of economics. Integrity and Agreement covers informal interactions that characterize social dilemmas, formal legal agreements between buyers and sellers, political agreements, employment agreements, religious agreements, and the social contract. In each of these cases, the possibility of integrity changes the answers given by neoclassical economics and instrumental rationality (rational decision-making in one's own self-interest) because to make an agreement that one has no intention of honoring is to lie. This simple but powerful fact seems to have eluded most economic analyses. Lanse Minkler is Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Connecticut. August 2008 Markets and Cultural Voices: Liberty vs. Power in the Lives of Mexican Amate PaintersTyler Cowen Rights: World This intriguing work explores the world of three amate artists. A native tradition, all of their painting is done in Mexico, yet, the finished product is sold almost exclusively to wealthy American art buyers. Cowen examines this cultural interaction between Mexico and the United States to see how globalization shapes the lives and the work of the artists and their families. The story of these three artists reveals that this exchange simultaneously creates economic opportunities for the artists, but has detrimental effects on the village. A view of the daily village life of three artists connected to the larger art world, this book should be of particular interest to those in the fields of cultural economics, Latino studies, economic anthropology and globalization. Tyler Cowen is Associate Professor and General Director of the Economics Department at George Mason University. His previous books include In Praise of Commercial Culture and What Price Fame?. Spring 2005 Race, Liberalism, and EconomicsDavid Colander, Robert E. Prasch, and Falguni A. Sheth, eds. Rights: World Noneconomists often think that economists' approach to race is almost exclusively one of laissez-faire. Racism, Liberalism, and Economics argues that economists' ideas are more complicated. The book considers economists' support of markets in relation to the challenge of race and race relations and argues that their support of laissez-faire has traditionally been based upon a broader philosophical foundation of liberalism and history: what markets have and have not achieved in the past, and how that past relates to the future. The book discusses the concepts of liberalism and racism, the history and use of these terms, and how that history relates to policy issues. It argues that liberalism is consistent with a wide variety of policies and that the broader philosophical issues are central in choosing policies. The contributors show how the evolution of racist ideas has been a subtle process that is woven into larger movements in the development of scientific thought; economic thinking is embedded in a larger social milieu. Previous discussions of policies toward race have been constrained by that social milieu, and, since World War II, have largely focused on ending legislated and state-sanctioned discrimination. In the past decade, the broader policy debate has moved on to questions about the existence and relative importance of intangible sources of inequality, including market structure, information asymmetries, cumulative processes, and cultural and/or social capital. This book is a product of, and a contribution to, this modern discussion. It is uniquely transdisciplinary, with contributions by and discussions among economists, philosophers, anthropologists, and literature scholars. The volume first examines the early history of work on race by economists and social scientists more generally. It continues by surveying American economists on race and featuring contributions that embody more modern approaches to race within economics. Finally it explores several important policy issues that follow from the discussion. David Colander is a Christian A. Johnson Distinguished Professor of Economics at Middlebury College. Robert E. Prasch is Associate Professor of Economics at Middlebury College. Falguni A. Sheth is Visiting Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Political Theory at Hampshire College. December 2006 The Street Porter and the Philosopher: Conversations on Analytical EgalitarianismSandra J. Peart and David M. Levy Rights: World Economics is a notoriously fractious field. An entirely new field—almost a discipline unto itself—has arisen out of the debate between mainstream scholars and their heterodox colleagues. The Street Porter and the Philosopher gathers an assortment of essays and transcripts from George Mason University's well-regarded Summer Institute for the Preservation of the History of Economic Thought (of which Peart is director and Levy assistant director), written by a diverse and accomplished list of scholars on the subject of "analytical egalitarianism." The editors define analytical egalitarianism as "a theoretical system that abstracts from any inherent difference among persons." The book posits the idea as a component of philosophies from opposite ends of the economics spectrum—poles which they embody in the persons of liberal philosopher John Rawls and the Nobel-laureate free market advocate James Buchanan—and explores the ways in which these shared ideas might provide the basis for a common conceptual language. Sandra J. Peart is Dean of the Jepson School of Leadership Studies, University of Richmond, Virginia. David M. Levy is Professor of Economics at George Mason University (GMU) and Research Associate at the Center for Study of Public Choice at GMU. They are Co-Directors of George Mason University's Summer Institute for the Preservation of the History of Economics. Fall 2008 The "Vanity of the Philosopher": From Equality to Hierarchy in Post-Classical EconomicsDavid M. Levy and Sandra J. Peart Rights: World A continuation of the ideas introduced in How the Dismal Science Got Its Name by David Levy, The 'Vanity of the Philosopher' picks up the themes of racism, eugenics, hierarchy, and egalitarianism in classical economics and examines the various attacks on classical economics' doctrine of human equality. Responding to the accusations over the years from the left and the right that the market economy has created, respectively, inequality or too much equality, Peart and Levy look at the role of the eugenics movement in pushing economists away from the classical economists' respect for individuals toward a more racist view at the turn of the century. Fall 2005 |
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