Episode Thirty

This unique episode features Gary Mongiovi of St. John's University and David Levy of George Mason University discussing their particular perspectives on the work of James Buchanan, winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Economics, and father of public choice economics and constitutional political economy. The episode begins with an excerpt from Professor Mongiovi's presentation at the first Winter Institute for the History of Economic Thought, held at Arizona State University in January. Mongiovi interprets Buchanan as (what Marx called) a "vulgar economist," who offered disguised ideological arguments as scientific analyses. In a roundtable discussion conducted after Mongiovi's talk, Professor Levy, co-author with Sandra Peart of the forthcoming book about Buchanan and his Virginia School of Political Economy, Towards an Economics of Natural Equals: A Documentary History of the Early Virginia School, argues that understanding Buchanan's economics requires a more nuanced interpretation. A fruitful scholarly discussion between Mongiovi and Levy follows.  For the symposium on Nancy MacLean's Democracy in Chains referenced in Professor Mongiovi's lecture, see: https://www.emerald.com/insight/publication/doi/10.1108/S0743-4154201937B For information on Levy and Peart's forthcoming book, see the book's page at Cambridge University Press: https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/towards-an-economics-of-natural-equals/8BFAF197C4ACF4724B70AC398C18A5A0 Smith and Marx Walk into a Bar is supported by a grant from the History of Economics Society: http://historyofeconomics.org