Norms in Law and Economics
First draft: April 7, 2003
This draft: March 29, 2005
Richard H. McAdams and Eric B. Rasmusen
Abstract
Everyone realizes the importance of social norms as guides to behavior and
substitutes for law, but coming up with a paradigm for analyzing norms has been
surprisingly difficult, as has systematic empirical study. In this chapter of the Handbook
of Law and Economics, edited by A. Mitchell Polinsky and Steven Shavell and
forthcoming in 2006, we survey the topic.