Polycentricity And Local Public Economies

Theory and empirical work on the organization of metropolitan government

Uses game theory to model institutions

How communities transcend the tragedy of the commons

There has been a rapid expansion of academic interest and publications on polycentricity. In the contemporary world, nearly all governance situations are polycentric, but people are not necessarily used to thinking this way. Governing Complexity provides an updated explanation of the concept of polycentric governance. The editors provide examples of it in contemporary settings involving complex natural resource systems, as well as a critical evaluation of the utility of the concept. With contributions from leading scholars in the field, this book makes the case that polycentric governance arrangements exist and it is possible for polycentric arrangements to perform well, persist for long periods, and adapt. Whether they actually function well, persist, or adapt depends on multiple factors that are reviewed and discussed, both theoretically and with examples from actual cases.

From inner-city crime and disorder to suburban sprawl that devours resources, all is not well in metropolitan America. While the scholarly community remains sharply divided over issues of metropolitan reform, Ron Oakerson delivers a carefully reasoned, empirically supported defense of the noncentralized metropolis. At its core is a cogent analytic framework that draws on economic reasoning without lapsing into market metaphors. The result is a civic interpretation of metropolitan governance that moves well beyond the often sterile debate over pros and cons. This compelling book not only makes clear the need for metropolitan governance but also sets forth the possibility - and the merit - of achieving metropolitan governance without metropolitan government.

Elinor (Lin) Ostrom was awarded the 2009 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for her pathbreaking research on "economic governance, especially the commons"; but she also made important contributions to several other fields of political economy and public policy. The range of topics she covered and the multiple methods she used might convey the mistaken impression that her body of work is disjointed and incoherent. This four-volume compendium of papers written by Lin, alone or with various coauthors (most notably including her husband and partner, Vincent), supplemented by others expanding on their work, brings together the common strands of research that serve to tie her impressive oeuvre together. That oeuvre, together with Vincent's own impressive body of work, has come to define a distinctive school of political-economic thought, the "Bloomington School." Each of the four volumes is organized around a central theme of Lin's work. Volume 1 explores the roles played by the concept polycentricity in the disciplines of public administration, political science, and other forms of political economy. Polycentricity denotes a complex system of governance in which public authorities, citizens, and private organizations work together to establish and enforce the rules that guide their behavior. Itencapsulates an approach toward policy analysis that blurs standard disciplinary boundaries between the social sciences. Throughout their long and remarkably productive careers, Elinor and Vincent Ostrom never tired of reminding us of the capacity of ordinary humans to transcend their own limitations by engaging with others in the myriad forms of collective action required to build and sustain a self-governing society. Their careers stand as exemplars of the proper relationship between rigorous scholarship and responsible citizenship.

Classical liberalism entails not only a theory about the scope of government and its relationship with the market but also a distinct view about how government should operate within its proper domain of public choices in non-market settings. Building on the political economy principles underpinning the works of diverse authors such as Friedrich Hayek, James Buchanan and Vincent and Elinor Ostrom, this book challenges the technocratic-epistocratic perspective in which social goals are defined by an aggregated social function and experts simply provide the means to attain them. The authors argue that individualism, freedom of choice, and freedom of association have deep implications on how we design, manage and assess our public governance arrangements. The book examines the knowledge and incentive problems associated with bureaucratic public administration while contrasting it with democratic governance. Aligica, Boettke, and Tarko argue that the focus should be on the diversity of opinions in any society regarding "what should be done" and on the design of democratic and polycentric institutions capable of limiting social conflicts and satisfying the preferences of as many people as possible. They thus fill a large gap in the literature, the public discourse, and the ways decision makers understand the nature and administration of the public sector.

The volume is a unique attempt to explore the relationship between two of the most interesting contemporary schools of thought evolving at the interface between social science and social philosophy: The Austrian tradition of F A Hayek and Ludwig von Mises, and the Bloomington tradition of Elinor Ostrom and Vincent Ostrom.