"This book will be a lasting contribution: it will be widely used in graduate courses on the topic, and by whoever wants to learn about these recent developments of economic theory. Its main strengths are clarity of exposition, completeness of treatment, balanced critical evaluation ... and, perhaps most valuable of all, a very successful attempt to integrate the many disparate contributions [to the new political economy] with earlier literature in public choice and public finance, as well with each other."--Guido Tabellini, Universita Bocconi and Centre for Economic Policy Research in London