"Public choice, or public choice theory, is 'the use of economic tools to deal with traditional problems of political science'. Its content includes the study of political behavior."
It focuses on how democratic institutions and processes can be used to promote public welfare and reduce rent-seeking.
Theoretical Foundations: The basic concepts and principles that underlie democratic public choice theory, including rational choice theory, political economy, and public goods theory.
Institutional Analysis: The study of the various institutions that shape political behavior and decision-making, such as voting systems, interest groups, and political parties.
Collective Action Problems: The challenges that arise when individuals pursue their self-interest, such as the tragedy of the commons or prisoner's dilemma, and the ways in which collective action can mitigate these challenges.
Rent-Seeking: The pursuit of economic or political gain through lobbying, bribery, or other means, and the ways in which rent-seeking behavior can distort public policy outcomes.
Regulatory Capture: The phenomenon in which regulatory bodies become captured by the interests they are supposed to regulate, leading to policy outcomes that favor those interests at the expense of the broader public.
Public Choice and Public Policy: The application of public choice theory to specific policy areas, such as environmental policy, public health, or economic regulation.
Voter Behavior and Elections: The factors that influence voter behavior, such as ideology, party affiliation, or charisma, and the ways in which elections are influenced by these factors.
Public Opinion: The attitudes and beliefs that shape public opinion, and the ways in which public opinion can influence political decision-making.
Behavioral Public Choice: The application of behavioral economics to public choice theory, and the ways in which cognitive biases, heuristics, and other factors influence political behavior and decision-making.
Comparative Public Choice: The comparison of political systems and institutions across countries and jurisdictions, and the ways in which institutional differences can shape political outcomes.
Social Choice Theory: Social choice theory looks at how individual preferences are aggregated to make collective decisions. It examines the implications of different voting systems, such as majority voting and proportional representation, and analyses how different systems cope with different situations.
Rent-Seeking Theory: Rent-seeking theory explores how individuals and groups may use political power to extract economic benefits. This can occur through lobbying, bribery, or cronyism, and it can lead to the misallocation of resources.
Bureaucratic Theory: Bureaucratic theory examines the behavior of government officials and bureaucrats, and how their influence can shape public policy outcomes.
Public Goods Theory: Public goods theory explores how individuals respond to collective goods and services that are shared by everyone, such as public infrastructure, education, and healthcare. It analyzes how financing and provision of these goods affect social welfare.
Constitutional Political Economy: Constitutional political economy explores how the design of constitutional rules and institutional arrangements impact public policy choices. It emphasizes the importance of institutions in shaping political outcomes.
Behavioral Public Choice: Behavioral public choice theory analyzes the impact of psychological biases, such as framing effects, cognitive dissonance, and groupthink, on collective decision-making.
Public Finance: Public finance looks at how governments finance their activities, including taxation, borrowing, and spending. It examines the trade-offs between redistributive policies and economic efficiency.
"It is the subset of positive political theory that studies self-interested agents (voters, politicians, bureaucrats) and their interactions."
"...which can be represented in a number of ways – using (for example) standard constrained utility maximization, game theory, or decision theory."
"Economist James M. Buchanan received the 1986 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences 'for his development of the contractual and constitutional bases for the theory of economic and political decision-making' in this space."
"In popular use, 'public choice' is often used as a shorthand for components of modern public choice theory that focus on how elected officials, bureaucrats and other government agents can be influenced by their own perceived self-interest when making decisions in their official roles."
"Public choice theory is also closely related to social choice theory, a mathematical approach to the aggregation of individual interests, welfare, or votes."
"Public choice analysis has roots in positive analysis ('what is') but is often used for normative purposes ('what ought to be') in order to identify a problem or to suggest improvements to constitutional rules."
"Rather, decisions are made by the combined choices of the individuals."
"The second is the use of markets in the political system, which was argued to be a return to true economics."
"The final is the self-interested nature of all individuals within the political system."
"As Buchanan and Tullock argued, 'the ultimate defense of the economic-individualist behavioral assumption must be empirical...The only final test of a model lies in its ability to assist in understanding real phenomena'."