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The individuals themselves, each in his own personal and sovereign right, entered into a compact with each other to produce a government; and this is the only mode in which governments have a right to arise and the only principle on which they have a right to exist.
Thomas PaineThe ideally perfect constitution of a public office is that in which the interest of the functionary is entirely coincident with his duty. No mere system will make it so, but still less can it be made so without a system, aptly devised for the purpose.
John Stuart MillWe have already discussed several works that have assumed uncertainty over future position to derive a normative theory of social choice. Rawls's (1971) theory discussed in Chapter 25 uses uncertainty over future position to derive principles of justice to be included in a social contract; Harsanyi (1953, 1955, 1977) uses it to derive an additive SWF (see Chapter 23).
Buchanan and Tullock (1962) develop a theory of constitutional government in which the constitution is written in a setting resembling that depicted by Harsanyi and Rawls. Individuals are uncertain about their future positions and thus are led out of self-interest to select rules that weigh the positions of all other individuals (Buchanan and Tullock, 1962, pp. 77–80). Buchanan and Tullock's theory is at once positive and normative.
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