Karl Mittermaier’s political economy

Abstract The purpose of this paper is to present Karl Mittermaier’s work as a form of political economy, very close to James Buchanan’s views of political economy. We indeed claim that Mittermaier’s analysis parallels Buchanan’s. Their criticism of standard economics is similar—they both oppose a deterministic form of economics. They also both claim that economists should focus on institutions, rather than on choice. To them, and in contrast with what mainstream economics assumes, choice is not a firm empirical basis on which economists can rely. From this perspective, Mittermaier’s political economy could be viewed as an extension of Buchanan’s.