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The greatest risks of Covid-19 are not arising from its direct effects on morbidity and mortality but from exaggerated aspirations to control such effects politically. A swift transformation from an epidemic to an endemic state of affairs may in case of a disease with comparatively low and unequally distributed mortality like covid-19 be an option, too. This needs to be laid out but it is not the task of science to plead for this or any other option.

Bruno Frey’s effort to provoke a discussion on the future of democracy seems as timely as his focus on direct democracy is appropriate. Since in his account the necessity of protecting individuals against democratic collective powers seems somewhat neglected this comment emphasizes that the democratic theory of the Calculus of Consent is—in a way—all about the justificatory logic of such protections. In the same vein, referenda are endorsed as strengthening and initiatives rejected as weakening controls imposed on democratic powers in a constitutional democracy.

Rejecting all knowledge claims concerning right and wrong in matters practical James Buchanan concurred with legal positivism that invalid law cannot be identified by its substantive content but only by an inherited defect in its factual creation. Beyond correct creation Buchanan proposed as a quasi-natural law constraint that unanimity in the shadow of individual veto power must at least be conceivable if a norm is to be law. The emerging hybrid conception of constitutional law is symptomatic for Buchanan’s never-ending but ultimately futile efforts to incorporate Kantian ideals of interpersonal respect into constitutional economics without imposing them as personal values.

La explicación de los fenómenos colectivos a partir de decisiones individuales racionales es el objetivo del enfoque económico de la teoría social. Este enfoque parece ser correcto en su núcleo, Sin embargo, su suposicion básica, es decir, que el decisor racional posee un control pleno de las alternativas de la respectiva situación de decisión, es inconciliable con un comportamiento guiado por reglas. Esta incoherencia impide que el enfoque económico pueda llegar a una adecuada comprensión del origen y mantenimiento de las instituciones sociales. Si la existencia de reglas y el comportamiento según reglas ha de ser explicado de acuerdo con el mismo modelo de comportamiento, es necesario introducir una modificación básica del \"modelo del comportamiento económico\". En este trabajo se esboza la. manera como puede llevarse a cabo esta modificación dentro del marco de consideraciones filosófico-sociales generales acerca de la razón de las reglas.

Whenever certain axioms are fulfilled decision-making under uncertainty can be modeled as if maximizing the expected utility of results of risky choices over a known state space with non-ambiguous probability weights. As opposed to this, practically coping with ever new uncertainties—new in that statistical, empirical evidence is lacking—requires a purely procedural bounded rationality approach as paradigmatically proposed here. The procedures can be evaluated and improved in view of evidence of their “objective” success or failure whereas the prescription to behave as if maximizing a subjective utility function is of no direct technological use for a boundedly rational actor.

Anthony de Jasay's work has been enormously influential, describing both a theoretical philosophical model for a stateless, liberal, free market order and offering analysis of and solutions to many of the technical economic problems associated with such a vision of society - most notably his work on the free rider and his return. In this book ten significant scholars in philosophy and political economy, including Nobel laureate in economics James Buchanan, pay tribute to the man and his work in a series of essays at once both respectful and critical. Ordered Anarchy focuses on three fundamental questions of libertarian thinking. Which are the basic libertarian principles and how do rights and liberties relate to each other? Is order possible and durable in an anarchic or quasi-anarchic society, and if so, under which preconditions? How and to what extent are the pillars of politics, such as the constitution, institutions and government, detrimental or beneficial to an enduring free society? While Narveson, Palmer and Bouillon focus on the first of these questions, the late Radnitzky and van Dun address the second. Benson, Holcombe and Kliemt provide answers to question number three, while Buchanan and Little highlight the role of Anthony de Jasay in this debate and the inspiration that his thinking has given to the authors of this volume.