Abstract

This essay pursues one historical and one conceptual task. The historical task is to reconstruct the “thinking-in-orders” tradition in political economy as a contextual approach to socio-economic reality, a tradition in which James Buchanan was socialized and to which he was a life-long contributor. The historical mainline extends from classical political economy to ordoliberalism, and shows how contextual economics has gained relevance in periods of transformation and transition. Living today in a world of fundamental transformation, the essay’s conceptual task is to depict how a recent research program, “New Economics of Order”, revitalizes the ordoliberal tradition by complementing it with Virginia School impulses of James Buchanan and Bloomington School impulses of Elinor and Vincent Ostrom. This new contextual research program conceptualizes the balance between the fragility stemming from the dynamics of globalization and digitalization, and the provision of statics through the state and civil society as demanded by the citizen.