Public Choice And Constitutional Democracy

James McGill Buchanan Jr. is the most famous founder and representative of Public Choice, Constitutional Economics and Politics by Principle. He was awarded the Alfred Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Science in 1986. Buchanan always has no confidence in government during all his academic life. He has a profound knowledge of the danger of government and has put forward some relevant original preventive countermeasures to it. His visions of the state have constituted comparatively integrated system info, although they are incompact and even inconsistent sometimes. This dissertation has reviewed the theories of Buchanan in a comprehensive overview and summarized the main contents of his state theory. Some correlative comments and practical checkout are also given to his state theory in the end. As the in-depth study of the state theory of Buchanan is very scarce whether at home or overseas now, this dissertation can supply a gap in a way.At first, this dissertation has discussed the intention and the bases of the state theory of Buchanan. The whole research plan of Buchanan focuses on the rational reconstruction of the state. His purpose is to found a new state theory which can prevent government failure and as well increase the potential of the state. Public Choice, Constitutional Economics and Politics by Principle are the main foundation of his state theory. They represent the three stages of the evolvement of the theories and paradigms of Buchanan respectively. State as a common focus runs his theories through all along. Public Choice is a non-market decision making theory and it came into being by the application of economics method to the politics. Constitutional Economics has evolved from Public Choice gradually. Its research program includes rules, how the rules run and how to select the rules. Constitutional democracy is the neclear concept in Constitutional Economics and its aim is to impose constitutional constrains on the non-market decision making action. Politics by Principle came into being by the application of the generality principle to politics. Buchanan attempted to make up the deficiency of his constitutional rules by the generality principle.Secondly, this dissertation has elaborated the main body of Buchanan's state theory. The state theory of Buchanan consists of four parts and they are the government failure theory, the constitutional democracy theory, the fiscal reform theory and the moral reconstruction theory. The four parts have an intrinsic and relatively compact logic relationship. Buchanan has educed the conclusion that the government would function abnormally according to the analysis of public choice. In order to settle the problem of government failure, Buchanan puts forwards the constitutional democracy theory. Buchanan suggests that a new constitution of the economic and political action should be founded in order to constraint the political action effectively. Constitutional democracy is a limited democracy under the constraints of constitution in fact and it is the core in his state theory. The fiscal reform theory of Buchanan has analyzed the fiscal failure and put forward some relevant fiscal constitutional reform countermeasures. Buchanan regards the competitive federalism as a mains that will effectively control or check the power of goverment. Because it is very difficult to prevent the depreciation of social capital through constitutional democracy and institutionals only,so he suggests institutional reform and moral reconstruction should be banded together to restore the lost social capital. The moral reconstruction theory of Buchanan is to resume the assistant function of the ethics to the society order.Thirdly, this dissertation has commented the state theory of Buchanan. Buchanan has integrated Politics and Economics and opened a new perspective of the study of the state theory. His theories have promoted the resurrection of the orthodox classical political economy grounded in the Smithian principle and also contributed to the progress of Political Philosophy, New Institutional Economics, New Public Management and etc. But whether Buchanan'theories or their paradigms have quite a few deficiencies.These limitations result in the transformation of his academic emphasis from the beginning Public Choice to Constitutional Economics, and then to Politics by Principle. Accordingly, his constitutional rules has also changed from unanimity rules to supramajority rules, and then to majority rules, and at last to the generality principle.The change of his theories shows that he tries to repair his theories, but he hasn't got obvious success up to now. His theories are still full of dispute and limitation.In the end, this dissertation has examined the practical significance of the state theory of Buchanan and as well made some practical checkout to it. His theory has propelled the global government reform and institutional change practice in a way. The public choice theory, the constitutional democracy theory, the moral reconstruction theory, the fairness and justice theories have some revelational significance to the political and economic system reform of our country. But his state theory is a kind of Neo-liberalism and is mainly to defend private ownership and capitalism essentially. As Buchanan always advocates the laissez-fair economy within limits, it would mislead the reform of the market economy system of the developing country in a way.So we must keep a watchful eye on the limitations of the theories of Buchanan when we use them for reference.