Morality, governance, and social institutions: reflections on Russell Hardin

Reflects on the research and career of political theorist Russell Hardin from scholars of Political Science, Philosophy, Sociology, Economics, and Law, among other disciplines.

Contributions address core issues of political theory as perceived by Hardin, starting with his insistence that many of the basic institutions of modern society and their formative historical beginnings can be understood as proceeding primarily from the self-interested motives of the participants.

Many of the contributions in this volume struggle with the constraints imposed on political theorizing by the idea of self-interested agents, or homo economicus.