Those toiling in the field of social economics seek to explain how the economy and social justice relate, and what this implies for economic theory and policy. Their invigorating scholarly output ranges from conceptual work on aligning economic institutions and policies with given ethical principles, to theoretical representations of individual behaviour that allow for both self-interested and ‘pro-social’ motives, and to original empirical work on persistent social issues such as poverty, inequality, and unfair discrimination.

Social economics is a well-established and flourishing area of research and study, and this new four-volume collection in the Routledge Major Works series, Critical Concepts in Economics, meets the need for an authoritative reference work to enable users to make better sense of its voluminous literature. Indeed, the sheer scale of the research output―and the breadth of the field―makes this anthology especially welcome. It provides a one-stop collection of classic and contemporary contributions to facilitate ready access to the most influential and important scholarship from a wide range of theoretical and practical perspectives.

Social Economics is fully indexed and has a comprehensive introduction, newly written by the editors, which places the material in its intellectual context. It is an essential work of reference and is destined to be valued by scholars and advanced students, as well as by practitioners and policy-makers, as a vital research resource.