Economic Behavior and Legal Institutions

The following sections are included:

• PREFACE

• CONTENTS

The following sections are included:

• A View of Human Society

• A Grand Hypothesis

• Founding Fathers and Jurisprudential Traditions

• Property Rights

• Various Types of Property Rights

• Contracts and Rights of Transfer

• A Survey of the Book

• Some Methodological Points

The following sections are included:

• Statutory Law and Case Law

• The Relations between Statutory Law and Case Law

• The Domains of Judge-Made Law and Politically-Based Law

The following sections are included:

• The Meaning of Efficiency

• Wealth, Risk and Utility

• A Classification of Acts and Decisions According to Their Effects on Wealth

The following sections are included:

• The Proposition on the Contents of the Law

• The Proposition on the Constitution

The following sections are included:

• Introduction

• The Reciprocity Theorem

• The Coase Theorem

The following sections are included:

• The Problems of Part Two

• The Invisible Hand

• The Idea of a Social Contract

• The Emergence of Constitutional Structures and Other Social Institutions

The following sections are included:

• A Brief Survey and Costs of Organizing Interaction

• Markets versus Firms

• More on Markets, More on Costs

• An Alternative Layout

• Firms

• Complications Concerning Costs, and a Conclusion

• A Note on Information Economics

• An Observation on Objects of Contracts

The following sections are included:

• Legal Sanctions Only: An Interlude

• Political Processes: Some Basic Aspects

• Buchanan and Tullock’s Analysis

• Results of Simple Majority Voting

• Broadening the Perspective

The following sections are included:

• The Legal Toolbox

• Formalized Property Rights — Basic Aspects

• Formalized Rights to Land in a Historical Perspective

• Detachment of Particular Rights to Land

• Formalized Property Rights to Other Components of the Physical Environment

• Intellectual Property Rights: Patents

• Copyrights, and Further Intellectual Property Rights

• A Brief Summing-Up

The following sections are included:

• Injunctions in Principle

• Injunctions in Practice

The following sections are included:

• Introduction

• Property Rules and Liability Rules

• More on Property and Liability Rules

• The Calabresi-Melamed Proposition

• Examples

• Do Actual Rules Accord with the Calabresi-Melamed Proposition?

• How is the Victim Involved?

• Compulsory Acquisitions

• Regulatory Takings

The following sections are included:

• When Is Harm Done a Violation of Property Rights?

• Care-Dependent versus Strict Liability

• Negligence in the Simplest Two-Person Case

• Implications for Incentives and Behavior

• Hand’s Rule Illustrated

• More than One Victim

• Negligence with a Variable Level of Care

The following sections are included:

• Introduction

• Responsibility of Victims

• Joint Responsibility on the Acting Side

• The Contingency of Property Rights under Negligence

The following sections are included:

• Intent

• Strict Liability

• The Choice between Negligence and Strict Liability

• The Role of Insurance

• Concluding Remarks

The following sections are included:

• Generally on the Size of Damages

• Pure Economic Losses

• More on Regulatory Takings

• Punishment

The following sections are included:

• Introduction

• Litigation versus Settlement

• The Behavior of Courts

The following sections are included:

• Introduction

• When Is There a Contract?

• Contracts Made Less Incomplete by General Clauses

• Contracts Made Less Incomplete by Non-Binding Statutory Rules

• Breaches of Contract and Case Law

The following sections are included:

• Introduction

• Legal Identity

• The Role of Investors

• Limited Liability and Priority Orderings of Claims

• Basic Properties of Corporations

• The Efficiency of Shareholding

• Mandatory Legal Rules: Basic Function and on Bankruptcy

• Legal Arrangements for Mitigating Agency Problems in Corporations

The following sections are included:

• Introduction

• A Survey of Restrictions on Rights of Transfer

• Some Notes on the Regulation Literature

• Restrictions on Employment Contracts

• Rules on Safety and “Fitness for Use” of Products

• Price Control

• Taxation

• Legal Restrictions on Money and Payments

• Restrictions on Rights of Transfer in the Setting of the Constitution

Please refer to full text.

The following sections are included:

• APPENDIX: A NOTE ON EXTERNALITY

• REFERENCES

• INDEX