ABSTRACT
The public choice analyst must understand the underlying structure of individual incentives and how the policy process responds to them. When the architects of the European Economic Community (EC) decided to include in their plans the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), they could have had no idea of the attention that would be heaped upon their creation. The ideas contained in the public choice literature are at their strongest in explaining seemingly irrational policies. The climate of increasing expenditures for the CAP also helped to inhibit the growth of commodity groups that could have challenged the dominance of the national farm organizations inherited from the pre-EC era. The rents delivered by the CAP provide the most important basis for the legitimacy these organizations have with their members. European Community agribusiness has shown only a limited ability to influence the CAP price support policies.
