Book ChapterDOI
Complex Policy Choices Regarding Agricultural Externalities: Efficiency, Equity and Acceptability
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In this paper, the authors identify a number of difficulties that arise in choosing public policies for regulating externalities generated by agricultural activity and highlight the importance of institutional structures for the transaction costs (or more generally administrative costs) of implementing agricultural policy.Abstract:
A feature of the research contribution of Konrad Hagedorn is his proposals for the integration of economic, social and political dimensions of agricultural policy. His holistic approach involves, in part, an extension of new institutionalism to public policy. This article identifies a number of difficulties that arise in choosing public policies for regulating externalities generated by agricultural activity. Firstly, it is noted that finding an economically efficient agricultural policy can be difficult because the functions involved can be irregular and may involve features associated with the mathematics of catastrophe. This adds to the complexity of public decision-making and increases the bounds on rational choice. Secondly, in light of the research results of behavioural economists and other considerations, it is shown that efficient economic solutions to resource allocation are not independent of the distribution of property rights, inevitably requiring consideration of whether the distribution of these rights is equitable. Thirdly, the importance of institutional structures for the transaction costs (or more generally administrative costs) of implementing agricultural policy are stressed and illustrated. Fourthly, the political acceptability or feasibility of implementing policies is demonstrated to be a relevant consideration in choosing agricultural policies, and it is noted that these are influenced by existing social structures and cultural factors. Some of these issues are briefly illustrated by public policies (such as those implied by the International Convention on Biological Diversity) designed or intended to extend property rights in genetic materials.read more
Citations
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Economics, ecology and the environment
TL;DR: A follow up to the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research Project 40 was published by the School of Economics, University of Queensland, 4072, Australia, as follow-up to the ACIAR project 40 as mentioned in this paper.
Posted ContentDOI
The Survival of Small-scale Agricultural Producers in Asia, particularly Vietnam: General Issues Illustrated by Vietnam's Agricultural Sector, especially its Pig Production
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present arguments for and against government strategies to promote large-scale agricultural units in emerging economies and presents an economic theory that models agricultural supply in emerging economics as being dualistic in nature.
Posted ContentDOI
Global Property Rights in Genetic Resources: Do They Involve Sound Economics? Will they Conserve Nature and Biodiversity?
TL;DR: In this article, the authors assess the possible social benefits and costs of granting property rights in genetic resources, and these are classified in order to discuss economic and legal reasons for granting or denying property rights to genetic resources.
Posted ContentDOI
The Neolithic Revolution and human societies: diverse origins and development paths
TL;DR: The transition from simple to complex hunting and gathering and then to farming is a sequence couched in social evolutionary terms as discussed by the authors, which suggests a pattern of progressive development resulting in increasing cultural complexity.
Posted ContentDOI
Hunter-Gatherer Societies: their Diversity and Evolutionary Processes
Serge Svizzero,Clem Tisdell +1 more
TL;DR: In this paper, it is argued that attributes which have been widely used to typify hunter-gatherer societies are inadequate for several reasons and that they fail to capture the full extent of the diversity of these societies.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI
The Nature of the Firm
TL;DR: In this paper, it is shown that a definition of a firm may be obtained which is not only realistic in that it corresponds to what is meant by a firm in the real world, but is tractable by two of the most powerful instruments of economic analysis developed by Marshall, the idea of the margin and that of substitution.
Journal ArticleDOI
The Market for “Lemons”: Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present a struggling attempt to give structure to the statement: "Business in under-developed countries is difficult"; in particular, a structure is given for determining the economic costs of dishonesty.
Book
The Problem of Social Cost
TL;DR: In this paper, it is argued that the suggested courses of action are inappropriate, in that they lead to results which are not necessarily, or even usually, desirable, and therefore, it is recommended to exclude the factory from residential districts (and presumably from other areas in which the emission of smoke would have harmful effects on others).
Book
The Economics of Welfare
TL;DR: Aslanbeigui et al. as mentioned in this paper discussed the relationship between the national dividend and economic and total welfare, and the size of the dividend to the allocation of resources in the economy and the institutional structure governing labor market operations.