Even better if you create a new field of study.
And commenter Hugh at Corrente Wire finds just such an area, though I am unsure if he is aware of this:
… This is my primary criticism of virtually all current economists. None of them write on, or try to construct an economic theory for, kleptocracy either because they are still in denial or because the sheer notion undercuts almost everything they believe and were taught. …The economics of kleptocracy, whether it be Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, or the United States, tremendously relvant and almost completely unexamined, at least by economists.
Certainly, it does lend itself quite as well to neat equations as do, for example, monetarism or the efficient markets hypothesis, but there is clearly gold, or at least academic glory, in "them thar hillls."
Interestingly enough, I do think that a lot of the framework has already been laid with the fields of behavioral economics (already Nobels there, Allais, Becker, and Simon) and the the theory of asymmetric information in markets (Stiglitz, Akerlof, and Spence won their Nobel for this).
It seems to me that in the intersection of these two fields, we can find the makings of a rigorous, and relatively quantitative, study of the operations of the economy of a kleptocracy, though I am neither an economist or an Academician, I am an engineer, dammit,* so your mileage may vary.
Even if this does not result in a Nobel, it would certainly generate a buzz, leading to tenure, and the inevitable academic economist groupies.†
*I LOVE IT when I get to go all Doctor McCoy!!!
†I'm not certain about the groupies, but that is what classic economic theory seems to imply.
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