essays in honor of robert d. tollison || interest groups, public choice and the economics of...

Interest Groups, Public Choice and the Economics of ReligionAuthor(s): Robert B. Ekelund, Jr. and Robert F. HébertSource: Public Choice, Vol. 142, No. 3/4, Essays in Honor of Robert D. Tollison (Mar., 2010),pp. 429-436Published by: SpringerStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40541978 .

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Public Choice (2010) 142: 429^36 DOI 10.1007/sl 1127-009-9543-7

Interest groups, public choice and the economics of religion

Robert B. Ekelund, Jr. · Robert F. Hebert

Received: 21 September 2009 / Accepted: 14 October 2009 / Published online: 27 October 2009 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2009

Abstract This article reviews Bob Tollison's conjoint contributions to the burgeoning area of the economics of religion, underscoring his integration of public choice and interest-

group themes into the microeconomic analysis of faith-based organizational architecture, institutional decision making and doctrinal innovation. Beginning with study of the medieval Catholic Church, moving forward to the Protestant Reformation and beyond, it supplies a timeline of developments and the major findings of each phase of his research program.

Keywords Economics of religion

1 Introduction

Bob Tollison tells his students that institutions matter; people don't. While there may be a tinge of hyperbole in this statement, it nevertheless emphasizes Tollison's conviction that institutions exert a major influence on the behavior of individuals. This conviction pervades Tollison's economic research, and extends in a somewhat unconventional way to the economics of religion. Most people consider the economics of religion to be a new field of research, but Bob Tollison knows better. Even if Adam Smith had not set the stage for investigations into the economics of religion centuries ago (Ekelund et al. 2005), Tollison's interests, training and disposition would have pulled him into this research vortex. Indeed, it would be difficult to find a field more amenable to the analytical tools of public choice and industrial organization, fields on which Tollison cut his academic teeth.

R.B. Ekelund, Jr. (IS!) Department of Economics, Auburn University, 404 Blake St., Auburn, AL 36830, USA e-mail: [email protected]

R.F. Hébert Department of Economics, Auburn University, 998 Stanford Ave Apt 515, Baton Rouge, LA 70808, USA



430 Public Choice (2010) 142: 429-436

2 The economics of religion: phase I

Tollison's interest in the economics of religion harks back to his reinterpretation of mercantilism as a process, a joint enterprise undertaken with Bob Ekelund in the late 1970s (see "Interest-Group Analysis in Economic History and the History of Economic Thought", this issue). The framework Ekelund and Tollison adopted for that collaboration was chosen for its promise in interpreting various episodes of economic history. In essence, their earlier work on mercantilism provided the first systematic attempt to show how state control of the market for monopoly rights imparted impetus to the rise and fall of a secular creed and its accompanying policies. It was almost immediately evident to them that the same framework could be useful in interpreting the rise and fall of religious creeds and policies (Ault et al. 1987) as well.

Shortly after the publication of Mercantilism as a Rent-Seeking Society in 1981, Ekelund and Tollison began to discuss among themselves applying the same approach to interpret the behavior of the oldest continuous institution of western civilization - the Roman Catholic Church. Challenges loomed immediately. Is religion a "product" or "service" that can be analyzed using economic tools? Adam Smith thought so, and two centuries later economists Azzi and Ehrenberg (1975) began to awaken renewed interest in the subject. Did the Ro- man Church operate as a multi-national firm? If so, when and where was it a "monopoly?" Historians place the apex of Church power and influence between the tenth and fifteenth centuries, so initially research investigations focused on this period. Ekelund tested the analytical waters at Auburn University by conducting a graduate seminar on this subject in the winter quarter of 1986. From this experience a decision was reached to take a microeconomic approach and focus on particular doctrines or episodes of church history, such as usury or the Crusades.

Bob Hébert was recruited the following year to join the two-man research team, form- ing a troika of "Bobs" (or, as an MIT Press staff member later dubbed the three authors, "gobs of bobs"). Three papers issued from this collaboration in fairly rapid succession. The first, "An Economic Model of the Medieval Church: Usury as a Form of Rent Seeking" (Ekelund et al. 1 989) showed that the medieval doctrine of usury, like other forms of legisla- tion and regulation, can be understood in terms of the interest-group theory of government. Even though the medieval church did not originate the doctrine of usury to promote the monopoly -bureaucratic interests of its ecclesiastical organization and temporal satellites, it proved adept at framing and altering it to suit its interests in the Middle Ages. In sum, historical evidence suggests that the medieval church engaged in opportunistic behavior, invoking the doctrine when it was a borrower and relaxing it when it was a lender.

The second paper, "The Economics of Sin and Redemption: Purgatory as a Market-Pull Innovation?" (Ekelund et al. 1992) portrayed purgatory as a doctrinal innovation introduced and refined by the medieval church to augment the demand for membership in the face of competition from heretical sects. It demonstrated, once again, the efficacy of public choice analysis for the study of the economics of religion.

The third paper, "An Economic Interpretation of the Medieval Crusades" (Anderson et al. 1992) investigated the payoffs to warlike behavior sponsored and financed by a religious institution. Again invoking the interest-group theory of institutional behavior, it concluded that the Crusades were part of a wealth-maximizing strategy of the medieval church.

These three papers provided the impetus (and partial content) for Sacred Trust: The Me- dieval Church as an Economic Firm (Ekelund et al. 1996), a joint product of Ekelund, Hébert, Tollison, Gary Anderson, and Audrey Davidson, the last of whom introduced into the mix her research on medieval monasteries and marriage markets.

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Public Choice (2010) 142: 429^36 431

2. 1 Sacred trust: major findings

In Sacred Trust, Tollison and company represented the medieval Roman Catholic Church as a multi-product firm. However, in order to make their analysis more tractable, the authors concentrated on "assurances of eternal salvation" as the ultimate product of Christianity. Granted this "product" is an abstraction of sorts, nevertheless it is one that can be modeled in terms of demand and supply. By contrast, Judaism, which also is a monotheistic religion, has always been vague concerning the nature of an afterlife. Sacred Trust focused on that

period of medieval religion after the twelfth century, in which Roman Catholicism faced

only fringe competition from Jews and Moors over large parts of Western Europe. During this era, canon law - the legal system of the church - began to supplant civil law in the "balkanized" countries of Western Europe. Ecclesiastical officials provided political support to reigning monarchs, supplied social services (e.g., hospitals, poor relief) and were deeply involved in the political, economic and social institutions of the time. For example, high church officials helped secular political entities wage wars, negotiate trade, and maintain armies.

The practical reach of the medieval church was in fact reminiscent of the long arm of

Imperial Rome in its heyday. In a more contemporary sense, the medieval organization of the Catholic Church resembled what Williamson (1975) calls an M-form firm. This kind of organization is characterized by a central office that conducts strategic long-term planning and controls overall financial allocations but allows (regional) divisions to have a high degree of autonomy in managing day-to-day operations. In the medieval church, the Vatican served as central office and dioceses, or bishoprics, exercised divisional authority over day-to-day operations. The pope assumed duties analogous to that of a CEO, and the Vatican established its own bank (i.e., papal camera) and board of directors (i.e., College of Cardinals).

From its central office in Rome the Vatican formulated and enforced corporate rules in the form of doctrine and dogma, entrusting the church's "retail" operations throughout Europe to various franchisees, namely monasteries and local parishes. Its monopoly status enabled the church to collect rents at many levels from its downstream agents or franchisees. Like all well-run corporations, the medieval church set up enforcement mechanisms and assigned enforcers - papal legates, local bishops, cameral agents, and so on - to prevent opportunistic behavior by its many agents and functionaries. In just about every respect, the medieval church functioned as the first multinational corporation.

The medieval church proved adept at using product differentiation to establish and maintain market dominance. This meant that the chief product of the church - assurances of eternal salvation - underwent a number of important changes. In order to obtain these assurances, medieval Roman Catholics were faced with an ever-expanding set of requirements. From the time of the ancient Romans, marriage had been a secular and civil matter, but in its ascendancy the medieval church made it almost a purely religious matter (while still re- quiring civil registrations as well). Church law prohibited close blood ties between marriage partners, required that marriage banns be announced, and that priests officiate at marriages for them to be valid. Whatever social benefits occurred, these rule changes had the effect of increasing the church's wealth and power, that is, the church used its authority to augment its income from fees and gain a measure of control over dynastic families.

The medieval church's usury doctrine - its infamous restrictions on interest-taking - have almost universally been condemned as a barrier to economic growth. But Tollison and his cohorts were the first to interpret it as a rent-seeking device. The doctrine provided multiple opportunities for opportunistic behavior. One such opportunity arose from selective enforcement. According to the evidence, restrictive rules were invoked by the church when

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432 Public Choice (2010) 142: 429-436

it was a borrower but not when it was a lender. Another opportunity arose from the atten- dant practice of restitution. Church doctrine held that since usury was a sin, usurers were condemned to hell if they did not confess and make restitution. In some cases (i.e., certa) of- fenders knew their "victims"; but in other cases (incerta) they did not. In the latter situation, restitution had to be made to the church in the name of unknown "victims". Obviously this

gave the medieval church another source of revenue, and a powerful tool to reward friends and punish enemies.

The Catholic Church has frequently been portrayed as a stagnant, tradition-bound institution. But Tollison and company showed that it could be innovative in its attempts to

preserve market power in the face of competition. The doctrine of purgatory, which has no firm basis in sacred scriptures, was one such innovation. It and its set of interlocking doctrines (penance, indulgences, auricular confession) provided another source of rents for the medieval church. Under its sway, the road to heaven became a toll road, with discriminatory charges levied according to one's income and/or wealth. Abuses of this doctrine, as we all know, became the lightening rod for later calls for reform, especially from Martin Luther (who had other complaints against the Roman Church as well).

Some of the practices adopted by the medieval church to prevent rival entry included

inquisitions, witch hunts, and doctrinal innovations such as excommunication and interdict. But perhaps the most strident form of entry control was the crusade. The medieval church

repeatedly engaged in military campaigns conducted principally during the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Ostensibly aimed at taking back the Holy Land from Muslim conquerors, these wars sought to curtail religious expansionism by an aggressive competitor. But as Tol- lison and his colleagues show, they also created economic opportunities for church officials

(e.g., sale of special indulgences), soldiers (e.g., plunder), and merchants (e.g., trade and

provisions). Sacred Trust was an attempt to break away from the traditional method of analyzing

religious history. The break springs from rejection of the public interest perspective in favor of the private interest perspective. The former maintains that an organization - in this case the medieval Catholic Church - behaves in such as way as to maximize some notion of

society's welfare. If such were the case, we would expect the medieval church to behave like a "good" government, i.e., provide its members with spiritual goods, social benefits and reliable information at competitive prices (i.e., marginal cost). The latter maintains that an organization seeks to maximize more parochial organizational aims and objectives (e.g., profits, power). On the historical and anecdotal evidence, Tollison et al. found little support for the first perspective and considerable evidence in support of the second.

3 The economics of religion: phase II

Sacred Trust confined its investigations to the late medieval era, when the Catholic Church had reached the peak of its power and prestige. In other words, it covered the rise and hegemony of Roman Catholicism before the Reformation began to chip away its market dominance. A second book by Ekelund, Hébert and Tollison (hereafter, EHT), The Marketplace of Christianity (2006) carried the story forward from the Reformation to the present. In a certain sense, this book picked up where Sacred Trust left off. Several papers led up to, and became absorbed into, the book published in 2006. The core issue of these papers was the Protestant Reformation.

By the early part of the sixteenth century several forces came together allowing successful and sustained entry into the market for Christian religion. Historians cite Martin Luther,

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Public Choice (2010) 142: 429-436 433

an Augustinian monk and theologian, as the pivotal figure of the Protestant Reformation. Luther's formal break with Rome occurred in 1521, and by 1530, through the Augsburg Confession, he had established an alternative religion that now bears his name. Luther was followed by John Calvin and dozens of other Protestant entrepreneurs who gave life to new forms of Christianity in the ensuing years.

Facts relating to the rupture within Christianity are clear enough, but the reasons for it and, especially for the widening success of the splinter religions in some markets but not in others, have received less scrutiny. EHT attempted to identify these reasons and group them into familiar economic categories. Supply-side factors played an important though complex role. For example, Gutenberg's invention of the movable- type printing press greatly facil- itated the spread of literacy and of religious reform writings, thus establishing a critical, technological "transmission" mechanism. Existing historical explanations of the Reforma- tion tend to be weighted toward supply-side factors, but EHT wanted to probe more deeply into the demand-side factors.

Fundamentally, consumers tend to switch their purchases whenever a competitor of- fers a lower price for a similar product. In Luther's day the full price of Catholicism's chief product - assurances of salvation - had simply become too complex to be credible for many demanders. Moreover, many demanders may have been pushed to the limit by the Catholic Church's (mostly undocumented) practice of price discrimination in dealing with penitents - both in the confessional and in granting indulgences. Quite simply, Luther and his kindred reformers offered salvation at a lower price. They sponsored a religion that bestowed "grace" freely on its members and that involved no (costly) intermediaries between individuals and God. The new spirituality maintained that every person was a priest, a communicant and a potential dweller in heaven.

In "An Economic Analysis of the Protestant Reformation" (2002), EHT focused on the question of why these reforms took place and took root in some socio-political environments but not others. They hypothesized that emergent entrepreneurial societies, which encoun- tered economic disruptions as they transitioned out of feudalism, encouraged Protestant entry; whereas feudal, rent-seeking societies, which tended to dissipate rather than create wealth, repressed Protestantism. The Roman Church was better able to hold on to its members and continue the practice of price discrimination in the latter economies.

In the middle ages, an institutional mechanism that affected the concentration of wealth, its distribution, or both, was the law(s) of primogeniture. Primogeniture tended to concen- trate wealth in dynastic families, making it easier for the Roman Church to collect rents. But by retarding the dispersion of venture capital, concentrated wealth discouraged entrepreneurial activities and inhibited economic development. EHT conducted informal tests of the linkage between primogeniture and the spread of Protestantism, finding support for the supposition that the two were inversely related. One test involved data collected by a so- ciologist, Swanson (1967), on dates of final (Protestant) settlement; and another used data gathered by Bairoch et al. (1988) on European city populations. They concluded on the basis of these "tests" that partible inheritance played a role in promoting economic growth and city size.

3.1 A theory of religious product change

The natural follow-up to an economic analysis of the Protestant Reformation is a similar treatment of the Catholic Counter- Reformation, which EHT (2004) treated as an incumbent- firm reaction to a new market entrant. But soon the desire to place these issues within a larger context emerged. In The Marketplace of Christianity (2006) EHT launched a more ambitious

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434 Public Choice (2010) 142: 429^436

attack on what they perceived as the central issues: What is a religious market? Can it be modeled in an economic sense? What form of religious "product" is most amenable to economic analysis? What is the nature of that product, its complexities, and its characteristics? Perhaps most importantly, what are the forces that impose changes on the core religious product over time?

Marketplace set forth a theory of the supply and demand for religious services -

specifically for assurances of eternal salvation - that applies to all forms of religious change, including those wrought by new market entrants, such as Protestantism. EHT argue that fundamentally the demand for a particular form of religion, like the demand for any product or service, is a function of its (full) price, the price of substitutes, consumer income, and a set of exogenous demand-supply "shifters" that affect individuals' attitudes toward risk -

including education and the level of scientific knowledge. Supply follows demand when net benefits to suppliers are positive.

EHT assert that initial entry in the near-monopoly religious market of the medieval church was the result of a combination of literacy-enhancing technological change and a drop in the full price of obtaining assurances of salvation. The Protestant religion(s) altered the nature of the product previously controlled by the Roman Catholic Church, and in the process, lowered its full price (i.e., sacrifice of money, effort, time). The initial impetus provided by Luther was followed almost immediately by competing "products" from other sects, especially Calvinism. Although schisms were not unknown to the Roman Church, they erupted more frequently and had more lasting effects once Protestantism took hold. EHT maintain that the entire history of Christianity, from Luther's successful break to the present, may be understood within the same analytical framework.

Contemporary Christian divisions and schisms are no exception. Changes in scientific knowledge related to biology and human behavior, for example, have created a demand for new interpretations of scripture and holy writ in many contemporary Christian denomina- tions. Issues such as abortion, gay marriage and stem cell research underlie these shifts. We are therefore witnessing changes in the demand for particular forms of religion because of changes in the "shifters" identified by EHT. In the United States and in other nations without established religions, these changes often take the form of "switching" among believers. On the other hand, in nations with formal state religions, such as Sweden and Italy, the consequence is most often decline in religious participation (Tollison 1993).

3.2 Weber's hypothesis revisited

The theory of religious product innovation propounded by EHT compelled them to revisit Max Weber's famous hypothesis concerning religion and the rise of capitalism. As com- monly interpreted, Weber's thesis is a "preference based" argument. According to conven- tional wisdom, Weber believed that the Calvinist variant of Protestantism provoked a change in individual preferences towards saving and investing, which in turn encouraged capitalism and economic development in England and northern Europe. In more narrow economic terms, Weber suggested that because Calvinist ethics support wealth accumulation, the marginal propensity to save among Protestants increased and exceeded that of Catholics, so that capital accumulation and economic growth occurred more rapidly in Protestant regions than in Catholic ones. This interpretation has been challenged by numerous critics, but whatever the correct interpretation may be, it is clear that Weber's thesis stressed demand-side elements to the neglect of supply-side elements.

Assuming that the Catholic Church approached perfect price discrimination in pricing its product, EHT contend that the resources released from a lower priced Protestant product provided an important stimulus to economic growth. By directing resources into narrow

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Public Choice (2010) 142: 429-436 435

channels, cathedral building (Bercea et al. 2005) and its satellite enterprises imposed opportunity costs on capital and labor. Protestant reforms in architecture, liturgy, custom and practice tended to lower these opportunity costs by freeing scarce productive resources for alternative uses. Church size and grandeur, as well as ecclesiastical ritual, were drastically reduced under Protestantism. Protestant countries also sharply curtailed the number of religious feast days, which were occasions to refrain from work under Catholic hegemony. Ag- gregate private capital and labor inputs therefore increased under Protestantism and output responded accordingly. Pilgrimages to holy shrines also were sharply reduced after the Ref- ormation. Available evidence suggests that the related practices of building shrines and making pilgrimages stopped almost completely in Protestant countries in the post-Reformation era.

Ultimately, Weber's thesis remains problematic. The introduction of various supply-side considerations, as EHT suggest, shed new light on the links between religious doctrine and economic growth, but the net effects are inconclusive. Fundamental problems remain, especially the endogeneity problem - namely, in which direction does causality run? Did Protes- tantism encourage economic development or did economic development encourage Protes- tantism? No firm answer is available at this great distance in time, but the broader notion that religion and economic development are somehow connected continues to fascinate economists and social scientists alike.

3.3 Other contributions

In several works outside the EHT nexus, Tollison pursued related issues involving the economics of religion. For example, Anderson and Tollison (1992) argued that a competitive market in religion results in a race to the bottom because rational beings will adopt those creeds providing the largest perceived benefits relative to cost, including the changes required in preferred behavior. Hence, a monopoly church can extract behavioral concessions from members due to the absence of alternatives. Many modern religions, for example, do not emphasize hell very much.

Two econometric studies by Tollison et al., focus on aspects of religious participation. In one paper, Lipford et al. (1993) found that religious participation is negatively related to various social pathologies, such as crime, abortion, teenage pregnancies, and so forth, so that religion crowds out police expenditures in a statistically meaningful sense. In another, Lip- ford and Tollison (2003) muster econometric support for the proposition that high incomes discourage religious participation for two reasons. The first is that high income leads to the substitution of work for religious activity. The second is that religious participation per se reduces the income of participants through its effects on preferences and earning potential.

4 Conclusion

Tollison's preoccupation with the economics of religion is not at all surprising. His inquir- ing mind has always looked for opportunities to apply the fundamentals of public choice, contemporary microeconomics and industrial organization in novel ways. The depth and breadth of his applications of these tools to different economic arenas is amazing, as this festschrift demonstrates. But the defining characteristic of Tollison's intellectual activity re- veals much more about our friend. We all know his fundamental generosity of spirit. He has always worked willingly and selflessly with others, finding that two (or more) minds are better than one. In the process, he has helped so many of his students and colleagues advance

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436 Public Choice (2010) 142: 42SM36

in our profession. Uncountable careers have been launched by Bob, who generously acts as progenitor and mentor, as circumstances require. Division of labor is a time-honored princi- ple of economics. And dispersion of risk is an accepted characteristic of prudent behavior. But for Bob Tollison there is a higher motivation: the sheer spread of knowledge. Who gets credit for discovery is less important to him than that discovery occurs and results are pro- mulgated. Those who have worked with him - and the numbers are legion - willingly testify to this fact.

Tollison's attitude toward economics and knowledge in general is best captured by anal- ogy to the great film maker, Ingmar Bergman. Woody Allen, who eulogized his late mentor, said that Bergman cared little about public responses to his films. Recalling his personal experience, Allen said: "I learned from his example to try to turn out the best work I'm capable of at that given moment, never giving in to the foolish world of hits and flops or succumbing to playing the glitzy role of the film director, but making a movie and moving on to the next one." That is so like Bob Tollison. He sets about his work in a determined and dignified fashion, caring little for praise, but everything for getting things right; then he nonchalantly moves on to the next project without fanfare. Given his personal indifference to adulation, it is only fitting that his colleagues raise a fuss in his name, which is the proper aim of this volume.

References

Anderson, G., Ekelund, R. B. Jr., Hébert, R. F., & Tollison, R. D. (1992). The medieval crusades: a public choice perspective. European Journal of Economic History, 21, 349-363.

Anderson, G., & Tollison, R. D. (1992). Morality and monopoly: the constitutional political economy of religious rules. Cato Journal, 12, 373-392.

Ault, R. W., Ekelund, R. B. Jr., & Tollison, R. D. (1987). The pope and the price of meat: a public choice perspective. Kyklos, 3, 399-413.

Azzi, C, & Ehrenberg, R. G. (1975). Household allocation of time and church attendance. Journal of Political Economy, 83, 27-56.

Bairoch, P., Bateau, J., & Chèvre, P. (1988). La population des villes européens, 800-1850. Geneva: Librairie Droz.

Bercea, Β., Ekelund, R. B. Jr., & Tollison, R. D. (2005). Cathedral building as an entry deterring device. Kyklos, 58, 453-466.

Ekelund, R. B. Jr., Hébert, R. F., & Tollison, R. D. (1989). An economic model of the medieval church: usury as a form of rent seeking. Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, 5, 307-33 1 .

Ekelund, R. B. Jr., Hébert, R. F., & Tollison, R. D. (1992). The economics of sin and redemption: purgatory as a market-pull innovation. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 19, 1-15.

Ekelund, R. B. Jr., Hébert, R. F., Tollison, R. D., Anderson, G., & Davidson, A. (1996). Sacred trust: the medieval church as an economic firm. London: Oxford University Press.

Ekelund, R. B. Jr., Hébert, R. F., & Tollison, R. D. (2002). An economic analysis of the protestant reformation. Journal of Political Economy, 110, 646-671 .

Ekelund, R. B. Jr., Hébert, R. F., & Tollison, R. D. (2004). The economics of the counter-reformation: incumbent firm reaction to market entry. Economic Inquiry, 42, 690-705.

Ekelund, R. B. Jr., Hébert, R. F., & Tollison, R. D. (2005). Adam Smith on religion and market structure. History of Political Economy, 37, 647-660.

Ekelund, R. B. Jr., Hébert, R. F., & Tollison, R. D. (2006). The marketplace of Christianity. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Lipford, J., & Tollison, R. D. (2003). Religious participation and income. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 24, 249-260.

Lipford, J., McCormick, R. E., & Tollison, R. D. (1993). Preaching matters. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 21, 235-250.

Swanson, G. E. (1967). Religion and regime: a sociological account of the Reformation. Ann Arbor: Univer- sity of Michigan Press.

Tollison, R. D. (1993). Competition, monopoly, and religion. Papers and proceedings of the Virginia Associ- ation of Economists, William A. Sandrige Lecture, pp. 1-4.

Williamson, O. (1975). Markets and hierarchies: analysis and antitrust implications. New York: Free Press.

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