The principal claim of this paper is that liberalism and democracy are not only compatible ideals, as F.A. Hayek has suggested, but rather complementary ideals. The argument in support of this claim is based on a distinction between three different levels at which liberalism and democracy can be compared, the level of their institutional embodiment, the level of their principal ideals, and the level of their underlying normative premise. It is argued that liberalism and democracy share as their common normative foundation the principle of individual sovereignty, and that their respective core ideals, the liberal principle of private autonomy and the democratic principle of citizen sovereignty, can be best understood as applications of the ideal of individual sovereignty to the realm of the private law society on the one side and to the ‘public’ realm of collective-political choice on the other.

Venture capitalism is a major institutional innovation based on identifying economies of scope in transactions of technological knowledge, bundled with managerial competence, reputation, screening procedures, and equity. It has paved the way to the emergence of new surrogate markets for knowledge, i.e. financial markets specialized in trading knowledge-intensive property rights. This development has important benefits in terms of risk management and hence profitability of investments in high-tech start-ups. The dynamic efficiency effects of the new institution also derive from the fact that the public at large, through its investments in knowledge-based income streams, contributes to the creation of new economically useful knowledge and capabilities.

The conceptual apparatus referred to generally as agency-structure or agency-institution is central to a great deal of social science, especially Institutional Economics. Despite its centrality, this apparatus has never been able to fully explain how institutions and social structures influence agents' intentions and actions. Economist, Geoff Hodgson and Sociologist, Margaret Archer have been at the forefront of endeavours to provide such an explanation. Section 1 of this paper elaborates upon Hodgson's ideas on institutional rules, habits, habituation, and the notion of reconstitutive downward causation. Section 2 elaborates upon Archer's ideas on structures, reflexive deliberation and the notion of an internal domain of mental primacy, and ends with a critical look at Archer's (brief) comments on rules and habits. The conclusion shows how a more nuanced understanding of structures, institutions, agency, habits, and deliberation, can inform research into a specific area, namely the analysis of labour markets.

This paper shows that in classical Athens, values and institutions encouraged many types of entrepreneurship. Successful entrepreneurs received social and political distinctions, and some entrepreneurial slaves gained their freedom. However, to deter extreme individualism, success in business was judged by the means used to acquire wealth, rather than simply the amount of wealth acquired. The system encouraged those entrepreneurs who were esteemed socially, to work hard, use ethical means, not to consume their wealth conspicuously but to share it with the rest of the people by undertaking public expenditures, and to abide by the laws and ordinances of the city-state.

The issue of property rights in land has taken central stage in research in institutional economics regarding developing countries. In the African context, numerous studies have dealt with the individualization and commodification of customary land rights. The issue of intra-family land rights tends however to remain a black box, regarding the content of the bundle of rights and duties, the identification of the right holders and the transfers of rights within the family. Drawing from the insights of institutional economics as well as economic and legal anthropology, this paper presents a conceptual framework to rigorously explore the issue of land rights through an economic ethnography.

Although there is now a thriving subdiscipline of economics and law, so far economists working on the theory of the firm have paid relatively little attention to earlier legal doctrines. One neglected juridical school of thought is the ‘real entity’ theory developed by William Jethro Brown (1868–1930) and others. Some writers have recently suggested that this has implications for our understanding of the nature of the firm.