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James M. Buchanan, Property as a Guarantor of Liberty, The Shaftesbury Papers (Edward Elgar, Aldershot, 1993), pp. 72, $12.95 paperback, ISBN 1-85278-733-3.
Fred Foldvary, Public Goods and Private Communities: the market provision of social services, The John Locke series (Edward Elgar, Aldershot, 1994), pp. 276, $69.95 hardback, ISBN 1-85278-951-4.
Charles K. Rowley, Liberty and the State, The Shaftesbury Papers (Edward Elgar, Aldershot, 1993), pp. 110, $12.95 paperback, ISBN 1-85278-853-4.
Gordon Tullock, Rent Seeking, The Shaftesbury Papers (Edward Elgar, Aldershot, 1993), pp. 104, $12.95 paperback, ISBN 1-85278-870-4.
Richard F. Wagner, Parchment, Guns and Constitutional Order, The Shaftesbury Papers (Edward Elgar, Aldershot, 1993), pp. 82, $12.95 paperback, ISBN 1-85278-839-9.
Four of the monographs under review are part of a series entitled `The Shaftesbury Papers', edited by Charles K. Rowley. The fifth monograph is from another series but about a related theme. The Earl of Shaftesbury was the Lord High Chancellor of England (1672-73) but fell out of favor with King Charles because of his efforts to uphold the Protestant cause during the English Civil War. Most significantly, Shaftesbury wanted to limit the monarch's power and defend the rights of landed property owners (that is, the rights of the English landlords). The arguments presented in these pamphlets appear to be in direct line of descent from the arguments and norms embraced by Shaftesbury, although they have nothing to do with kings, churches, or religious wars. Rather, the arguments have to do with private property and its preservation in the face of dangerous voting majorities. Whereas Shaftesbury fought for the integrity of the large property owners against the king, the new Shaftesburians want to protect property owners from encroachments by not only the executive branch of government but the legislative and judicial branches as well! Furthermore, in the discussion of `rent seeking' we learn that not all existing rights structures are worth protecting. That is because some property rights structures are the consequence of a wasteful competition for special privileges dispensed by the state.
To this consideration of the Shaftesbury series, I thought it instructive to add a review of a book by a younger author closely allied with the contributors to the series. Fred Foldvary's Public Goods and Private Communities, part of the John Locke series, originated as...