A theory of the state : economic rights, legal rights, and the scope of the state
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
A theory of the state : economic rights, legal rights, and the scope of the state
(Political economy of institutions and decisions)
Cambridge University Press, 2002
- : pbk
Available at 27 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
Bibliography: p. 277-281
Includes index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
This book models the emergence of the state, and the forces that shape it. State creation is bound to protection needs. A specialized protector-ruler is efficient, but is also self-seeking. Individuals will install a ruler only after they create a mechanism to control him. Among the offshoots of the organized protection are legal system and decision-making procedures that include voting. The initial 'state of nature' may gradually evolve into a rule-of-law state. The state endows individuals with rights by delineating what it will protect. Enforcement, however, is never perfect. People use third parties such as firms to enforce agreements. As commodities become standardized, scale economies increase. In order to exploit the economies of within-state enforcement, the state will expand the contact enforcement territory by treaty or by conquest. The force may explain the creation of rule-of-law empires.
Table of Contents
- Preface
- 1. Introduction
- Part I. The Emergence of Protection and Third-Party Enforcement: 2. The state and the enforcement of agreements
- 3. Third-party enforcement and the state
- 4. The choice among enforcement forms
- 5. Anonymous exchange, mixed enforcement and vertical integration
- 6. Jurisdictional issues
- 7. Collective action and collective decisions
- 8. Tying the protector's hand: the agreement between subjects and protector
- Part II. The Emergence of Legal Institutions: 9. Legal rights
- 10. The state's enhancement of market trade
- 11. The size and scope of the state
- Part III. The Character of the State: 12. Merger and local autonomy
- 13. The distinction between 'legitimate' and 'criminal' states
- 14. Power, violent conflict and political evolution
- 15. The time path of change under dictatorships and under rule-of-law regimes
- 16. Recapitulation and an epilogue
- References
- Index.
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