Coase, Ostrom and the Economics of Government Action What this theory [mid-century neoclassical welfare economics] demonstrated, in a nutshell, was that perfect markets work perfectly, imperfect markets work imperfectly, and perfect government can cause imperfect markets to also function perfectly.[1] Steven Medema The theme of Chapter 1 was (...)
Continue Reading → Economic Theory and Market Failure: A Synopsis To speak about economics as applied to environmental harms, one must know something about economics generally and its conceptual frameworks as applied to policy. While possibly seeming dry and abstruse, these fundamental concepts have direct relevance, including for those more interested in environmental (...)
Continue Reading → Introduction At the launch of the Centre for Enterprise, Markets and Ethics, our founding chairman Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach remarked that: [W]hile a market economy is superior to other economic systems which have been tried, it is far from flawless. Financial stability, environmental sustainability and inequality in income and wealth (...)
Continue Reading →Born in New York City and raised in the UK, Rabbi Benjy Morgan spent 14 years studying in the top Rabbinic training academies in the world. He is the Chief Executive Officer of the Jewish Learning Exchange (JLE), a London-based organisation which aims to teach Judaism’s relevance and deeper meaning (...)
Continue Reading →Maurice, Baron Glasman is a political theorist, academic, social commentator, and Labour life peer, best known as a founder of Blue Labour. He is Senior Lecturer in Political Theory at London Metropolitan University, Director of its Faith and Citizenship Programme and a columnist for the New Statesman, Unherd, The Tablet (...)
Continue Reading →Danny Kruger has been the Member of Parliament for East Wiltshire, previously Devizes, since 2019. He became David Cameron’s chief speechwriter in 2006, whilst Cameron was Leader of the Opposition. He left this role two years later to work full-time at a youth crime prevention charity that he had co-founded (...)
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What lessons are to be learnt from the great estates and their role in the development and redevelopment of London? The physical development of a city is not, as is often supposed, merely another aspect of its economic activity. Decisions on the use of land are absolutely fundamental to the (...)
Continue Reading → Parts 2 and 3 emphasised the historical role of private planning in the development and redevelopment of modern London, and argued that it had some of the benefits often claimed for regulated systems, such as responding dynamically to changing circumstances and solving externality problems. This chapter traces the role of (...)
Continue Reading → London’s expansion was neither uniform nor managed: London was expanding in the 1870s hand over fist, or rather in fits and starts. How was all that growth managed? Of planning in the modern sense of the word there was none to speak of, either physical or economic. London was still (...)
Continue Reading → We can learn much from urban history. Perhaps more interesting than the record of any particular time period are the dynamics of the system: how cities respond to changes in markets, technology and social forces. In the last 70 years, parts of London have changed greatly. The skyline, (...)
Continue Reading → From the seventeenth century onward countless town planners (who would never have called themselves that) were engaged in imposing rationally conceived patterns of growth and development on London. For the most part they were not associated with any political body but were connected with one or another of the ground (...)
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