Bureaucracy

Ostrom questioned Mises' argument that all bureaucracy is inherently rigid and inefficient. He showed that polycentric governance—where multiple institutions interact in a decentralized way—can sometimes be more efficient than private markets in managing public goods.

Mises identifies the growing scale and scope of the administrative state and issues a warning against the tendency to bureaucratize political, economic, and social life, arguing that such an expansion in the bureaucratization of human activity would infringe upon individual freedom to manage our…

We are always tempted to reform government agencies, to fiddle with organization charts, creating new units and scrapping old ones. We hear the sirens’ song: We could do good, things could be better.

Friedrich Hayek explains how central planning leads to totalitarianism.

Niskanen applies public choice theory to bureaucracy, explaining inefficiencies.

Explores why intellectuals and policymakers often oppose capitalism and free markets.