Legal Entrepreneurship within a System of Entangled Political Economy

Abstract

Entrepreneurship is the economic source of change in society. While it is ubiquitous, its particular qualities depend on the system of political economy in which it operates. We distinguish between two systems of democratic political economy. One system is the classically liberal system where economic entities interact within the market while political entities do little more than maintain the legal framework necessary for the market order. This system of political economy entails clear distinction between the realms of market and political action. The alternative system is an entangled political economy, where the distinction between realms is obscured due to interaction among market and political entities. While entrepreneurship operates in both systems, the substantive properties of entrepreneurship will differ between the two systems, as this paper explores within the particular context of legal entrepreneurship.

Keywords: entrepreneurship; legal framework; constitutional political economy; ORDO liberalism; common law efficiency; entangled political economy.

JEL Classification: D72, K40, P16, P51