Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Series editors' preface
- Preface
- CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION
- CHAPTER 2 THE PRIMARY IMPORTANCE OF DISTRIBUTIONAL CONFLICT
- CHAPTER 3 INSTITUTIONS AND STRATEGIC CHOICE: INFORMATION, SANCTIONS, AND SOCIAL EXPECTATIONS
- CHAPTER 4 THE SPONTANEOUS EMERGENCE OF SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS: CONTEMPORARY THEORIES OF INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE
- CHAPTER 5 THE SPONTANEOUS EMERGENCE OF SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS: A BARGAINING THEORY OF EMERGENCE AND CHANGE
- CHAPTER 6 STABILITY AND CHANGE: CONFLICTS OVER FORMAL INSTITUTIONS
- CHAPTER 7 CONCLUSION
- Bibliography
- Index
Series editors' preface
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 September 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Series editors' preface
- Preface
- CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION
- CHAPTER 2 THE PRIMARY IMPORTANCE OF DISTRIBUTIONAL CONFLICT
- CHAPTER 3 INSTITUTIONS AND STRATEGIC CHOICE: INFORMATION, SANCTIONS, AND SOCIAL EXPECTATIONS
- CHAPTER 4 THE SPONTANEOUS EMERGENCE OF SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS: CONTEMPORARY THEORIES OF INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE
- CHAPTER 5 THE SPONTANEOUS EMERGENCE OF SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS: A BARGAINING THEORY OF EMERGENCE AND CHANGE
- CHAPTER 6 STABILITY AND CHANGE: CONFLICTS OVER FORMAL INSTITUTIONS
- CHAPTER 7 CONCLUSION
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The Cambridge series on the Political Economy of Institutions and Decisions is built around attempts to answer two central questions: How do institutions evolve in response to individual incentives, strategies, and choices? and, How do institutions affect the performance of political and economic systems? The scope of the series is comparative and historical rather than international or specifically American, and the focus is positive rather than normative.
This book takes the view that social institutions are informal and formal rules which constrain individual behavior. Knight argues that making rational choices about institutions requires that individuals form expectations about their own and others' future preferences. The institutions themselves can help ensure consistency of expectations across individuals, a precondition for institutional equilibrium or stability. Individuals then act to secure those institutions that create the “best” constraints in view of their expectations. Knight argues that what counts in making some chosen rules or arrangements “best” is their distributional consequences rather than their expected social or aggregate output. Thus, although maintaining a rational-choice framework, Knight drops the welfare-maximizing postulate of the economic theory of efficient institutions in favor of the assumption that politics is about distributional conflict, yet still shows how strategic action and bargaining play a role in the development and maintenance of these institutions.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Institutions and Social Conflict , pp. ix - xPublisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1992