"Interdisciplinarity" has become a noise, rather than an analytic concept. What a pleasure it is to see a real interdisciplinary effort, and on an important set of topics. Interdisciplinary work is when a scholar who has mastered an approach applies it in a new and interesting way. This book contains a number of genuinely important chapters, and all the chapters are worth reading. The reason the work is important is that no one approach can explain how institutions begin, survive, or change. But this one book shows these questions can be answered, and in ways that are interesting and fun to read.

Michael C. Munger, Director of PPE Program, Duke University

The public choice tradition began two generations ago, set in motion by such scholars as James Buchanan, Gordon Tullock, and Vincent Ostrom. While public choice has clearly ossified through maturation, these nine essays by freshly-minted scholars point the way toward a possible reinvigoration of public choice by incorporating new multidisciplinary insights into the study of a society’s political order.

Richard E. Wagner, Harris Professor of Economics, George Mason University

Interdisciplinary Studies of the Political Order integrates important insights from the Austrian, Bloomington, and Virginia Political Economy schools of thought. The young scholars, whose work is collected in this volume, push our understanding of both the interrelated foundations of these schools of thought and how to apply the insights to a variety of contemporary issues.

Benjamin Powell, Director of the Free Market Institute, Texas Tech University