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From Models to Experiments; James Buchanan and Charles Plott

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Part of the book series: Remaking Economics: Eminent Post-War Economists ((EPWE))

Abstract

Buchanan’s work, and in particular The Calculus of Consent, which he wrote with Gordon Tullock, has been foundational in the field of public choice. One of his students, Charles Plott, became a pioneer with multiple seminal contributions in the field of experimental public choice. In this chapter we focus on Buchanan’s work on decision making under majority rule, and any influence it may have had on Plott. While Buchanan and Tullock address environments with single decisions, they focus much more on decision making under repeated votes, a topic they found of great interest. Plott’s seminal 1978 paper with Morris Fiorina, however, focuses on single decisions. It may seem puzzling, then, that Plott has often suggested Buchanan’s influence on his work. We offer a resolution to this puzzle.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA

    Gil Hersch

  2. Department of Economics, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA, USA

    Daniel Houser

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  1. Gil Hersch
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  2. Daniel Houser
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Correspondence to Gil Hersch .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics, George Mason University, Fairfax, VA, USA

    Richard E. Wagner

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Hersch, G., Houser, D. (2018). From Models to Experiments; James Buchanan and Charles Plott. In: Wagner, R. (eds) James M. Buchanan. Remaking Economics: Eminent Post-War Economists. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-03080-3_40

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-03080-3_40

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-03079-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-03080-3

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