Skip Navigation

Cambridge Journal of Economics 2005 29(2):263-288; doi:10.1093/cje/bei027
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Campbell, D.
Right arrow Articles by Klaes, M.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Related Collections
Right arrow B31 - Individuals
Right arrow D21 - Firm Behavior
Right arrow D23 - Organizational Behavior; Transaction Costs; Property Rights
Right arrow K00 - General
Right arrow K21 - Antitrust Law
Right arrow L14 - Transactional Relationships; Contracts and Reputation; Networks
Right arrow L40 - General
Right arrow L50 - General
Right arrow L51 - Economics of Regulation
Right arrow P26 - Political Economy; Property Rights
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

Cambridge Journal of Economics, Vol. 29, No. 2, © Cambridge Political Economy Society 2005; all rights reserved

The principle of institutional direction: Coase's regulatory critique of intervention

David Campbell and Matthias Klaes*

* Department of Law, University of Durham, and Department of Economics, University of Stirling, respectively

Address for correspondence: Matthias Klaes, Department of Economics, University of Stirling, Stirling, Scotland FK9 4LA; email: office{at}mklaes.net

That Coase's political convictions changed from an early socialism to a later neo-liberalism stands in apparent contrast to the theoretical consistency of his early (‘The Nature of the Firm’) and later (‘The Problem of Social Cost’) contributions to economics. Offering further evidence about his early views in particular, this paper takes a fresh look at Coase's views on competition and antitrust to show that he consistently stressed the role of what we shall call the principle of ‘institutional direction’, and that this principle involves an important criticism of both neo-liberal and socialist views on regulation and state intervention.

Key Words: Ronald H. Coase • Comparative institutional analysis • Socialist economics • Critique of neo-liberalism • Critique of intervention • Institutional direction

JEL classifications: D23, L5, L14, K0

Manuscript received May 31, 2002; final version received June 6, 2003.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.