Transaction Costs and Policy Analysis

Dear Colleagues,

“Transaction costs”, as a well-established concept in New Institutional Economics, has been used to explain and analyse the costs of running economic systems, since Nobel Laureate Ronald Coase's seminal article, The Nature of the Firm. Transaction costs are often hidden and include, for example, the costs of collecting information, negotiating, contracting, or making payments. Although there are many studies that have explored such costs in the context of firms and businesses, there are still rather limited studies that investigate the effects of high transaction costs on designing and implementing public policy instruments, particularly land, planning, and environmental policy instruments. Taking account of transaction costs is particularly important in the context of public policies, because high levels of transaction costs can result in reduced degrees of policy effectiveness, efficiency, and equity. High levels of such costs can hinder people from participating in a policy instrument whilst lowering policy efficiency. Additionally, given transaction costs are often unevenly distributed among the parties involved, their magnitude and distribution have considerable influence on the equity of the policy. Therefore, such transaction costs have considerable implications for policy design and implementation, including the policies focused on sustainability agenda.

This Special Issue of Sustainability welcomes theoretical and empirical contributions that aim at providing deeper insights into the effects of transaction costs on the process of designing and implementing land, planning, and environmental policy instruments. Of particular interest are studies that analyse the size, timing, and distribution of transaction costs, and their impacts on the effectiveness, efficiency, and equity of policy instruments. Empirical analyses of the policies focused on sustainability agenda are especially welcome. The geographical scope of the Special Issue is global, and contributions regarding case studies and policy instruments from both developed and developing countries will be equally relevant and welcome.

Dr. Sina Shahab
Guest Editor

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