`Charles R. Plott has a formidable armoury of experience backed up with an inquiring and rigorous intellect: an economist interested in getting clear answers to important questions. Before effectively becoming a full-time experimental economist, he enjoyed a fine reputation as a theorist in the area between political science and economics. By 1986 Plott had acquired a reputation as an insightful experimentalist - inspired and encouraged by Vernon Smith with whom he worked for a period before establishing his own experimental laboratory. Plott's contributions to the field of experimental economics are impressive. From 1981, since the Social Science Citation Index records begin, he has a total of 44 publications listed in this and related fields, many with co-authors who themselves are now established experimentalists. He has clearly stimulated a whole generation of economists into doing high quality experimental research. Many of these 44 papers are classics of their kind. The skill, energy and efficiency with which he operates is impressive.'

- John Hey, University of York, UK and University of Bari, Italy

Public Economics, Political Processes and Policy Applications brings together an impressive collection of Charles R. Plott's work in experimental economics.

The papers in this volume represent the beginnings of Professor Plott's experimental research on public economics, public choice and political processes, which are the origin for experimental work in mechanism design and experimental testbeds. He addresses the problems related to committees and public choice institutions, and develops methodological foundations that were later exported to other areas of economics. In these groundbreaking experiments strategies for posing questions are developed. The fundamental principles that shape policy studies are discovered and refined.

The volume goes on to apply the principles to the prediction of group choice using game theory and voting theory, the power of special institutions and processes to determine outcomes, and the concept of equilibrium and equilibration in decision processes.

Finally, the papers reflect a maturing of the methodologies, devoting attention to their success in the area of institutional design in general and of policy in particular. With deep roots in problems related to policy analysis that are carried throughout the volume, Public Economics, Political Processes and Policy Applications will be a fascinating read for those with an interest in experimental economics, the methodology of economics, political theory, and political economy.