World governance today is characterized by international organizations lacking democratic legitimacy and control by the citizens they claim to represent. They are also criticized for being inefficient. This leads to violent protests and to NGOs having great influence. To address these problems,...

The distinguished authors in this volume address the fundamental causes for such heterogeneous international experiences, placing particular emphasis on the role of institutions. They demonstrate how the study of economic development is increasingly linked to the development of institutions,...

This timely and important book presents a unique study of happiness from both economic and political perspectives. It offers an overview of contemporary research on the emergent field of happiness studies and contains contributions by some of the leading figures in the field.

This timely and important volume addresses the serious challenges faced by democracy in contemporary society. With contributions from some of the world’s most prestigious scholars of public choice and political science, this comprehensive collection presents a complete overview of the...

The measurement of preferences is an ongoing challenge for economists. New insights can be won by relying on reported subjective well-being in addition to observed behaviour. Empirical estimates of well-being functions, based on a sample of 5500 Swiss residents, find that unemployed persons are...

In recent years, there has been a steadily increasing interest on the part of economists in happiness research. We argue that reported subjective well-being is a satisfactory empirical approximation to individual utility and that happiness research is able to contribute important insights for...

Economists have long considered themselves fortunate that micro-economic theory needs only be based on relative utility, as it is widely believed that utility is not measurable in absolute terms. But this view is no longer valid. The measurement of happiness constitutes a good approximation to...

People not only obtain utility from actual outcomes but also from the conditions which lead to these outcomes. The paper proposes an economic concept of this notion of procedural utility. Preferences beyond outcome can be manifold. We distinguish procedural utility people get from institutions...