Forthcoming in: KYKLOS, International Review for Social Sciences. Volume 59, No. 2/2006. This version: November 1st, 2005 One day when the queen asked her mirror: Mirror, mirror, on the wall, Who in this land is fairest of all? It answered: You, my queen, are fair; it’s true. But Snow-White is a thousand times fairer than you. Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm Political Economics versus Public Choice Two views of political economy in competition* Charles B. Blankart and Gerrit B. Koester Humboldt University Berlin Department of Economics Spandauer Str. 1 10178 Berlin
[email protected] [email protected] JEL: P48, B50, D72, E6 Abstract: Political economics, like public choice, is defined as the economic analysis of politics. But its exponents claim that political economics is not a complement, but the successor of public choice, a new paradigm replacing the public-choice approach. We evaluate this claim of political economics in three fields: political business cycles, integration and secession, and constitutional political economy. We find that political economics has contributed substantially to the first, but little to the second and the third, where it sticks to the world of planning and benevolent dictators. Hence the public-choice paradigm emerges strengthened from its dispute with political economics. I INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................................... 2 II THE PUBLIC-CHOICE PARADIGM AND ITS CHALLENGERS.......................................................