In 2010, Haiti was ravaged by a brutal earthquake that affected the lives of millions. The call to assist those in need was heard around the globe. Yet two years later humanitarian efforts led by governments and NGOs have largely failed. Resources are not reaching the needy due to bureaucratic red tape, and many assets have been squandered. How can efforts intended to help the suffering fail so badly? In this timely and provocative book, Christopher J. Coyne uses the economic way of thinki...

This Element surveys the field of defense, peace, and war economics with particular emphasis on the contributions made by Austrian economists. I first review treatments of defense, peace, and war by the classical economists. I then discuss the rise of a distinct and systematic defense, peace, and war economics field of study starting in the 1960s. Next, I consider the contributions by Austrian economists to the field. This includes the economic analysis of the nature of the war economy, pr...

The U.S. government's prime enemy in the War on Terror is not a shadowy mastermind dispatching suicide bombers. It is the informed American citizen.With Manufacturing Militarism, Christopher J. Coyne and Abigail R. Hall detail how military propaganda has targeted Americans since 9/11. From the darkened cinema to the football field to the airport screening line, the U.S. government has purposefully inflated the actual threat of terrorism and the necessity o...

How can people peacefully cooperate with others to improve their lives? This important book answers this question by introducing readers to the Austrian school of economics.Austrian economics is a heterodox tradition with a distinct philosophy of science stressing purposive individual action, subjective value, the unique nature of economic knowledge, and the importance of prices and markets for coordination. Beginning in Austria in the 1870s with the work of Carl Menger, the ideas ...

This volume explores and engages with the key thinkers and ideas of the Austrian School of economics to better understand how individuals coordinate their separate interests in a peaceful and productive manner by unintentionally forming not only market prices but also rules, customs, cultural norms and other institutional arrangements that allow specialization and trade. Together, these dynamics generate a market order by ameliorating the potential for social conflict, and, in turn, facili...

Understanding entrepreneurship as alertness to potential profit opportunities and the activities involved with bringing those opportunities to life and public policy as laws, regulations, and activities of government, this volume analyzes the intersection of the two to show how public policy influences entrepreneurship. Using a mix of theoretical and applied research, the contributors argue that policies which incentivize productive entrepreneurship will advance economic well-being, but th...

A copy of the top-secret memo below recently came into our hands, and we thought we should bring it to your attention!“Dear National Security Elite:In an ideal world, the public would simply accept whatever their leaders—you, in other words—told them. They would comply with restrictions and mandates, not as a matter of mere obedience, but as a matter of unquestionable patriotic duty.But we don’t live in an ideal world.And with the ...

Written for an audience of students, general readers, and economists alike, this Element is a primer on the field of the economics of conflict and peace. It offers a reasonably comprehensive, systematic, and detailed overview - even if in broad strokes - of the field's orthodox and heterodox history of thought and current theories and evidence. The authors view this Element as a baseline account on which to build a future, separate and more fully developed, work on the economics of peace, ...

The origin of the Austrian School of economics is the publication of Carl Menger’s Principles of Economics in 1871. Menger, William Stanley Jevons, and Léon Walras are considered the co-founders of the “marginal revolution” in economics, a shift to the marginal utility theory of value from the labour theory of value. The revolutionists argued that value is not based on the amount of labour expended but reflects how useful people perceive the commodity to be in satisfying their ends.

This Element explores the topics of terrorism, counterterrorism, and the US government's war on terror following the September 11, 2001 terror attacks. It draw on insights from Austrian and public choice economics. First, the foundations of the economics of terrorism are discussed emphasizing that the behaviors of terrorists and counter-terrorists are purposeful and goal-oriented. Then, the economics of counterterrorism policies and the importance of institutional change is considered. Nex...

Political Process: New Perspectives on the Virginia and Bloomington Schools explores political process as emphasized by the Virginia and Bloomington schools of political economy. Though the Virginia school of public choice and Bloomington school of institutional analysis have risen to prominence through the works of James Buchanan, Gordon Tullock, and Elinor Ostrom; their joint emphasis on political process has been neglected. The chapters in this volume explore the idea of politi...

The political process focuses on the ways that people come together to engage in collective decision making in a variety of contexts. The central elements of the political process include: the formation of rules, the subsequent interactions that take place within those rules, and the evolution of rules over time.Scholars working in the area of Virginia political economy—e.g., James Buchanan and Gordon Tullock—emphasize the importance of applying the tools of economics to non-market...