The first edition of Democracy and welfare economics, written by Hans van den Doel, was published in 1979. Since then, the economic theory of political decision-making has met a steadily growing interest. Many publications, in part theoretical but also – and above all things – of an empirical nature, have seen the light. As a consequence it became more and more desirable, if not necessary, in the course of time to up-date this book. As Hans van den Doel himself was not able to do so on account of ill-health, Ben van Velthoven took charge of the revision which now has led to the appearance of this second edition of Democracy and welfare economics.

For this second edition we have critically gone through the whole text. First, of course, recent theoretical insights have been coped with. Then, we have done our best to record the results of empirical research wherever possible. Furthermore we have seized the opportunity to eliminate some obscurities in the original formulation and to clarify the graphical and mathematical derivations, which remain few in number. Finally the sequence of the argument has been altered in a number of places for didactic reasons, while maintaining the quite specific design of the book.