Introduction -- Efficiency norm: pareto optimality -- Economic efficiency and the market mechanism -- Economic efficiency and public goods -- Economic efficiency in the presence of externalities -- Collective decision making -- Principles of cost-benefit analysis -- Allocational effects of public projects -- Measuring costs and benefits -- Nonmarket valuation -- Investment criteria and project selection -- The choice of discount rate -- Income distribution as an evaluation criterion -- Applications of cost-benefit analysis -- Evaluation issues in environmental studies -- Evaluation studies: health care -- CBA in a developing country context.