Recent Economic Perspectives on Political Economy

In recent years some of the best theoretical work on the political economy of political institutions and processes has begun surfacing outside the political science mainstream in high quality economics journals. This two-part paper surveys these contributions from a recent five-year period. In Part I, the focus is on elections, voting and information aggregation, followed by treatments of parties, candidates, and coalitions. In Part II, papers on economic performance and redistribution, constitutional design, and incentives, institutions, and the quality of political elites are discussed. Part II concludes with a discussion of the methodological bases common to economics and political science, the way economists have used political science research, and some new themes and arbitrage opportunities. In recent years some of the best theoretical work on the political economy of political institutions and processes has begun surfacing outside the political science mainstream – published in high quality economics journals or appearing as working papers on web sites devoted to economics and political economy. Partly this is a consequence of a greater receptivity of economics outlets to this genre of work – greater than in the past, for certain, and possibly greater than in mainstream political science venues at present. Partly this is a result of economists coming more firmly to the conclusion that modeling governments and politicians is central to their own enterprise. Whilst many of the key insights of this recent research have been taken on board by formal political theorists, despite not always appearing in the mainstream political science journals, they are often lost to a wider political science audience. There is a need, therefore, to provide scholars with “peripheral vision,” facilitating exposure to more specialized theoretical literatures that are not otherwise easily accessible to the general reader. This is our intention in the present essay and its companion.