James F. Buchanan is a political economist who is the Advisory General Director of America. He has and still continues to make significant contributions to the field of economics. He is mostly known for his ‘Public Choice Theory’ in economics, which revolutionized the way economists assess economic and political decision-making. Professor Buchanan’s seminal work opened new vistas for analyzing the effect of politician’s non-economic forces on government economic policy.
Life and Career of James Buchanan
James McGill Buchanan was born in Murfreesboro in Tennessee on 3rd October 1919. Buchanan completed his graduation from Middle Tennessee Normal School in 1940. After receiving his B.A. degree he moved on to the University of Tennessee to obtain his Masters degree and finally ended up in the University of Chicago obtaining his PhD from there in 1948.
Buchanan started off his career being a part of the faculty at George Mason University and is also an important figure in the Virginia School of Political Economy. He has also taught in the University of Virginia, Florida State University and the Virginia Polytechnic Institute. He established the Thomas Jefferson Center and taught at the UCLA. He shifted with the center to the new venue at GMU. There he researched on the theory of logrolling.
Contribution to Economics
Buchanan has contributed a great deal towards enriching the subject. His theories have also found relevance in the modern times. He has enhanced the pertinence of the theories in the lives of people. The most significant work of Buchanan, which is considered to be a landmark in the discipline of economics, is the book “The Calculus of Consent” published in 1962. This book contains a rightful blend of economics and political science. The book explores the political organization of a free society, which is based on the economic organization of the society in turn. The conception of such a society is based on the economic factors that influence the society in a constructive way.
The book traces the relationship between economics and politics. It states that the decisions taken by the government include the economic factors and they cannot exclude those factors while making decisions. According to the book the collective decisions form a part of the public sector and they must be studied in the proposed way. It also describes the Constitution of the country as the demarcation between the private and the public sector. Public choice is therefore separated into two phases namely pre-constitutional and post-constitutional. His contribution to the discipline does not remain confined to the exploration of the relation between economics and political science but it has extended to another sphere. The fiscal aspect adds another dimension to the whole relationship. His work named “The Power to Tax: Analytical foundations of a Fiscal Constitution” had broken grounds in analyzing the process in which the fiscal decisions are taken by the government. The book has also challenged the role of self-interest in political decision-making.
The Public Choice Theory propounded by Buchanan can be approached from two perspectives. They are:
The Normative Approach-this approach aspires to trace the principles based on which organized public decisions are taken.
The Positivist Branch- the branch that endeavors to develop theories of behavior, which could be predicted.
Major Works of Buchanan
James Buchanan had written many books, which came to be considered as the landmark in applied economics. Some of the names of his books are:
The Calculus of Consent: Logical Foundations of Constitutional Democracy
Cost and Choice
The Limits of Liberty
Liberty, Market and State
Better Than Plowing and Other Personal Essays (An Autobiography)
Awards Received by Buchanan
Buchanan for his achievements had been honored with the coveted Nobel Prize in 1986. He received it for his work on the Public Choice Theory.