Escape from Democracy
The Role of Experts and the Public in Economic Policy
David M Levy author Sandra J Peart author
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Cambridge University Press
Published:24th Dec '16
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
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- Hardback£95.00(9781107142398)
This text interrogates the role of experts in governing and proposes a viable alternative: governing by democratic discussion.
David M. Levy and Sandra J. Peart show how setting economic policy goals and putting experts in charge of implementing them fails dramatically. They argue that determining the ends and the means can be accomplished more successfully through an ongoing democratic discussion. This provides transparency and protects against expert bias.The orthodox view of economic policy holds that public deliberation sets the goals or ends, and then experts select the means to implement these goals. This assumes that experts are no more than trustworthy servants of the public interest. David M. Levy and Sandra J. Peart examine the historical record to consider cases in which experts were trusted with disastrous results, such as eugenics, the regulatory use of security ratings, and central economic planning. This history suggests that experts have not only the public interest but also their own interests to consider. The authors then recover and extend an alternative view of economic policy that subjects experts' proposals to further discussion, resulting in transparency and ensuring that the public obtains the best insights of experts in economics while avoiding pitfalls such as expert bias.
'You might think that an age of anticipated global warming is the wrong time to question the popular habit of deference to experts. David M. Levy and Sandra J. Peart argue otherwise in Escape from Democracy, contending that democratic discussion, not hierarchical domination, is the mode appropriate to the public sphere. They trace the eclipse of the democratic tradition in university economics. They illustrate the dangers of runaway authority with two disturbing cases: the eugenics movement, and comparative economics during the Cold War. This is a wise and high-spirited book by two of economics' foremost public intellectuals.' David Warsh, Proprietor of the weekly commentary Economic Principals
'Levy and Peart demonstrate brilliantly the dangers of deferring to experts. When we treat politics like engineering or dentistry we ask the experts to choose for us. This technocratic error is the escape from democracy the authors warn us against. If we are serious about equality, we must be serious about democracy. Theirs is a message - and an analysis - that we, the people, urgently need to hear.' Roger Koppl, Syracuse University
'Levy and Peart are impressively knowledgeable in the primary and secondary classics of history of economics, not to mention statistics, game theory and archival research. They get excited by the subject and have produced an engrossing and relevant volume. As these notes may suggest, their book encourages discussion, even debate.' Joseph Persky, EH.Net
'This is a fascinating and important book … we have here the beginning of a much-needed and long-overdue conversation.' Charles R. McCann, History of Economic Ideas
ISBN: 9781316507131
Dimensions: 228mm x 153mm x 13mm
Weight: 480g
290 pages