Encyclopedia of Law and Economics

Law and Economics deals with the economic analysis of legal relations, legal provisions, laws and regulations and is a research field which has a long tradition in economics. It was lost after the expulsion of some of the leading economists from Germany during 1933 to 1938, but then revived in Chicago.  Both the subject of Law of Economics and the need for a concise Encyclopedia is particularly relevant in Europe today.  Currently in the European Union there are several different legal cultures: the Anglo-Saxon legal framework, the German legal framework, which for example also includes Greece, and the Roman legal family—three jurisdictions which have to be covered with one and the same theory. In the EU, the task of the European Commission to interact with the various European jurisdictions means different legal cultures collaborating and some degree of harmonization is necessary. The result is an immediate need, if only for the science, to show how a given problem is solved in each legal tradition and jurisdiction. This Encyclopedia provides both a common language and precise definitions in the field, which will be useful in the future to avoid misunderstandings during harmonization of EU Law.

Alain Marciano is full professor of economics at the University of Montpellier. He is mainly interested in the emergence and existence of norms (formal and informal, juridical and non-juridical) and mechanisms coordination/cooperation among individuals. A major area of his work consists in studying the history and methodology of recent economics – with a focus on law and economics and public choice. He has edited many books in law and economics, and published a reader in law and economics. He has published articles in different journals (International Review of Law and Economics, Public Choice, Constitutional Political Economy, the Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, Law and Contemporary Problems, the Journal of Institutional Economics, History of Political Economy, the Journal of the History of Economic Thought, the European Journal of History of Economic Thought, the Journal of Economic Methodology). He serves as Co-Editor-in-Chief European Journal of Law and Economics,and is in the boards of different journals. He is series Editor of Palgrave Studies in Institutions, Economics and Law (Palgrave Macmillan).

Giovanni B. Ramello is Full Professor of Industrial Economics at Università del Piemonte Orientale. In addition he coordinates the IEL International PhD Program in Comparative Analysis of Institutions, Economics and Law hosted at Collegio Carlo Alberto.

He mainly teaches industrial economics and law and economics, while his research cover topics in industrial organization, antitrust and regulation,  intellectual property rights and market structure, and economic analysis of litigation and of judicial systems. 

He published articles in several international leading journals and has worked as an advisor for ministries of countries  all around the world and other international institutions. Further he serves as Co-Editor-in-Chief European Journal of Law and Economics, as Editor of the European Journal of Comparative Economics and  as an Associate Editor of the Journal of Industrial and Business Economics. Besides the editorship of the Encyclopedia of Law and Economics he is series Editor of Palgrave Studies in Institutions, Economics and Law (Palgrave Macmillan).