Public choice is one of the few examples of a “creative community” emerging from within the professional academic structures of economics in the postwar period. This article examines the early development of the public choice movement at the University of Virginia and how this movement both...

This article, explore the origin of public choice compared with the traditional view of political science. The emphasize is on the methodology and the initial research program developed by Buchanan and Tullock.

Gordon Tullock’s impact as a scholar was far broader than his own research because he was an initiator of new fields of research rather than one who modestly extended pre-existing pastures. His import as founding editor of Public Choice, as an ambassador for public choice, and as a teacher,...