Economic Theory & Philosophy

The fifth edition of Economic Concepts and Applications continues to echo the great nineteenth-century economist, Alfred Marshall, who said that economics is 'a study of mankind in the ordinary business of life'. Economics, at its core, is about making decisions: the course of st...udy chosen by a student; the job chosen by a job seeker; the goods purchased by a consumer; the crops planted by a farmer; the pricing decisions of a producer; a government's decision to raise or lower taxes - all are economic decisions and have economic consequences. Some decisions have little impact on the economy, while others can have a global impact. This text aims to help the reader apply economic concepts and models to the real world. The fifth edition of this popular textbook covers economic concepts, theories and models required by students of introductory economics courses. The author seeks to show students how economic tools can be used to understand the economic forces present in our daily lives. Global warming and globalisation are examples of contemporary issues raised for discussion. The text has a clear flow of essential economic principles and uses appendices to elaborate on more technical content.
Read more

'This is a beautifully written and important book. Read it' Martin Wolf, Financial Times From world-renowned economist Paul Collier, a candid diagnosis of the failures of capitalism and a pragmatic and realistic vision for how we can repair it Deep new rifts are tearing apart the... fabric of Britain and other Western societies: thriving cities versus the provinces, the highly skilled elite versus the less educated, wealthy versus developing countries. As these divides deepen, we have lost the sense of ethical obligation to others that was crucial to the rise of post-war social democracy. So far these rifts have been answered only by the revivalist ideologies of populism and socialism, leading to the seismic upheavals of Trump, Brexit and the return of the far right in Germany. We have heard many critiques of capitalism but no one has laid out a realistic way to fix it, until now. In a passionate and polemical book, celebrated economist Paul Collier outlines brilliantly original and ethical ways of healing these rifts - economic, social and cultural - with the cool head of pragmatism, rather than the fervour of ideological revivalism. He reveals how he has personally lived across these three divides, moving from working-class Sheffield to hyper-competitive Oxford, and working between Britain and Africa, and acknowledges some of the failings of his profession. Drawing on his own solutions as well as ideas from some of the world's most distinguished social scientists, he shows us how to save capitalism from itself - and free ourselves from the intellectual baggage of the 20th century. These times are in desperate need of Paul Collier's insights. The Future of Capitalism restores common sense to our views of morality, as it also describes their critical role in what makes families, organizations, and nations work. It is the most revolutionary work of social science since Keynes. Let's hope it will also be the most influential - George Akerlof, Nobel Laureate in Economics,
Read more

The experience of the last decade has not been kind to the image of economists- asleep at the wheel (perhaps with the foot on the gas pedal) in the run-up to the great recession, squabbling about how to get out of it, tone-deaf in discussions of the plight of Greece or the Euro a...rea; they seem to have lost the ability to provide reliable guidance on the great problems of the day. In this ambitious, provocative book Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo show how traditional western-centric thinking has failed to explain what is happening to people in a newly globalized world- in short Good Economics has been done badly. This precise but accessible book covers many of the most essential issues of our day, including why migration doesn't follow the law of supply and demand, why trade liberalization can drive unemployment up and wages down and why nobody can really explain why and when growth happens. In doing so, they seek to reclaim this essential terrain, and to offer readers an economist's view of the most pressing issues of the day, one that is candid about the complexities, the zones of ignorance, and the areas of genuine disagreement.
Read more

'A must-read. Acemoglu and Robinson are intellectual heavyweights of the first rank . . . erudite and fascinating' Paul Collier, Guardian, on Why Nations Fail In this profoundly important follow up to their global bestseller, Acemoglu and Robinson provide a powerful new framework... for looking at countries' development through the way that the state interacts with society. This conceptualisation - in which any country can be located on a simple diagram and its future predicted - is new and based on decades of their research. The power distribution between state and society affects how peaceful societies are, what types of institutions develop, how much oppression and fear people suffer, how their economies are organized, and how rich they are. Full of entertaining stories from the past (it starts with the wife of a Nigerian ruler fleeing Abuja with 38 suitcases of cash), Balance of Power sheds light on issues from the present and has practical political ideas for the future. 'An intellectually rich book that develops an important thesis with verve' Martin Wolf, Financial Times, on Why Nations Fail
Read more

Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations is the first book of modern political economy, and still provides the foundation for the study of that discipline. Along with important discussions of economics and political theory, it mixes plain common sense with large measures of history, philos...ophy, psychology and sociology.
Read more