Simon Chen

Institutional Choices and Designs in Neighborhood Management Simon Chen

This book uses new institutional economics (NIE) to discuss current trends in planning and the institutional shift from government to market via homeowners associations(HOA). The private governance of HOAs actually is not a pure market-oriented planning institution. It has transaction costs stemming from the use of democracy in making collective choices. Its institutional position, therefore, is in the middle between government and Multiple-tenant income properties (like shopping mall), a pure market-oriented planning institution. The idea of private planning and management via HOAs, however, needs to admit that if HOAs are more efficient than municipal government at the present time, it may only be because, its public services are delivered by property management companies, which are more competitive and more efficient than direct government providers. So, the book helps to clarify a necessary distinction between contractual governance and contractual management. The book also furthers our understanding of HOAs and implications of HOAs in the urban management and governance.