This book is the outcome of a workshop at Michigan State University on the career of A. Allan Schmid offering a collection of original essays that explore several approaches to understanding the impact of alternative legal-economic institutions.

Sandra S. Batie is the Elton R. Smith Professor in Food and Agricultural Policy, Department of Agricultural Economics, Michigan State University and Fellow of the American Agricultural Economics Association. Nicholas Mercuro is Professor of Law in Residence at the Michigan State University College of Law and member of the faculty of MSU's James Madison College and founder and co-editor of The Economics of Legal Relationships series with Routledge.

1 Power and the troublesome economist: complementarities among recent institutional theorists 2 Some problems in assessing the evolution and impact of institutions 3 Developing a method for analyzing institutional change 4 Does economic development require "certain" property rights? 5 Institutional economics as volitional pragmatism 6 Institutions and rationality 7 Simplicity in institutional design 8 The essence of economics: law, participation and institutional choice (two ways) 9 Is law facilitating or inhibiting transactions? 10 On Institutional Individualism as a middle-way mode of explanation for approaching organizational issues 11 The role of attitudes in action and institutional change: an evolutionary perspective 12 Post-Keynesian institutionalism and the anxious society 13 Toward a theory of induced institutional change: power, labor markets, and institutional change 14 The instituted nature of market information: the case of induced innovation and environmental regulation 15 The role of culture and social norms in theories of institutional change: the case of agricultural cooperatives 16 Payment for environmental services and other institutions for protecting drinking water in eastern Costa Rica 17 A dialogue on institutions: various approaches to assessing the evolution and impact of alternative institutional structures