Aesthetics and Economics

Aesthetics and Economics is a pioneering effort at treating aesthetics from the point of view of economic theory, and addresses the contradictions which have arisen from economists' work in this field over the years. Starting from an historical review of the treatment of aesthetics in economic thought, Aesthetics and Economics goes through the integration of a number of recent advances in economic thinking with the main topics of aesthetics, from creativity to interpretation. The subject is systematically treated on the grounds of a restatement of the optimization analysis on non-consequentialist bases, starting from the Kantian definition of aesthetic judgement up to its contemporary developments. A specific information asymmetry characterizing the agents' behaviours arises from the aesthetic qualification of consumption, production and investment processes, thus affecting the usual equilibrium and optimization conditions, resulting in new institutional interventions in the market. `Certification' of the aesthetic nature of goods and stocks is needed and gives place to original market strategies and optimization problems.