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Most of the existing textbooks on international economics - a widely taught and ighly popular subject - are long and too detailed and advanced for many students. This book, first published in 1983, and written by a respected leading authority, presents the essentials of the topic in a simple and straightforward way. The book contains the minimum of algebra and avoids detailed proofs. It incorporates the most recent theoretical advances and discusses current issues in comercial policy. Moreover, it puts less emphasis than other textbooks on trade theory and more on balance of payments theory an

Twentieth-century economics has been characterized as developing an engineering mentality, but this history suggests the importance of distinguishing between a design approach and a problem-solving approach. The former is to be found in economists tasked with reconstructing broken economies (from war or depression) as well as creating "modern" economies in postwar developmental states. The latter is marked by the development of engineering-type tools to solve particular economic problems. While the former mode came into its own in mid-century, and lost confidence in later years, the latter grew up from the early part of the century and maintains its kudos. Accounting for this history depends in part on multiple and sometimes complex intersections between economists and other disciplines. But at least as important were the economic and political events of the century, which molded economists' experiences and fostered their ambitions to make their technocratic economics usable in the world. This involved more than fashioning "tools" to solve specific problems, more than making "cameras" to describe and analyze the world, but even creating "engines" to help design and run economies.

This Element examines economic perspectives on improving quality and safety in healthcare. Though competition is generally recognised by economists as an important driver of improvement, it may not work so straightforwardly in healthcare - in part because some services are provided by very few organisations, but also because people are not always easily able to judge healthcare quality and rarely have to pay the full price for services. Different approaches for stimulating improvement are therefore needed, and the authors look at examples from the care home, primary care, and hospital sectors. They emphasise the need for economic evaluation of improvement efforts, based on the principle that improvement activities should only be undertaken if the benefits are worth at least the costs of implementing and running them. Using examples, they explain the economic approach to evaluating how benefits and costs of improvement efforts can be compared by applying cost-effectiveness analysis. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.