Economic Explanation: Selected Papers on Economics by Zhang Wuchang

Author: Zhang Wuchen
Publisher:
Publication Date: 2000-11-01
Features: The book The Economic Explanations collects 25 articles published by Professor Zhang in various magazines from 1968 to 1998, basically encompassing his academic thought. In his inaugural speech at HKU in 1982, Professor Zhang advocated: "Let us be the vanguards of economic explanation." This collection is a fulfillment of this idea. Professor Zhang firmly believed that economics must be a science of explanation, and only economic theories that can explain phenomena possess vitality. Among the wave of economic explanation that rose in the (19)50s and 60s, Professor Zhang was undoubtedly one of the outstanding vanguards. In the manuscript of The Economic Explanations, Zhang Wuchen incorporates a novel, important, widely interpreted, yet content that all current textbooks have long delayed including – the research findings of "New Institutional Economics," specifically the theories of property rights and transaction costs. These contents are certainly one of the most parts of The Economic Explanations. By comparing the relevant chapters with the conclusions of Coase and Alchian, readers can easily see whether "the new" surpasses "the old." Another feature of the theoretical system in The Economic Explanations is its logical coherence, consistency, and seamless flow, without a distinction between "micro" and "macro." Most of the once-popular macroeconomic theory models have been overturned by facts. Since The Economic Explanations only explains economic principles that remain steadfast to this day and does not serve as a history of economic thought...