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An American Theory of Public Choice
“Public choice,” of course, is just a highfalutin circumlocution for “politics.” But the name is usually applied to the leading neoclassical version articulated by James Buchanan and Gordon Tullock in...
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Capitalism’s Enigma and Its Future
It is impossible to exaggerate the enigma within the term “capitalism.” It is in fact one of those big concepts concocted by its enemies, indeed by its chief antagonist Karl Marx. To this very day its...
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To Make a Market
The author has two avowed aims: first, to show how Adam Smith and Georg Hegel have defined the debate in political economy, and, second, to address normative issues raised in ‘market societies’. As...
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Les Maladies and Le Monde
When I was a student, my friends and I would stay up all night to discuss such questions as the truth or otherwise of determinism. Was the entire future of the universe immanent in its past, indeed had...
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Vision of the Humanitarians
The grand narrative goes something like this: Some nations are rich, others poor. Poverty begets misery. Since we all wish to live in a world defined less by misery than by happiness, rich nations have...
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Adam Smith, Rationalized
Recent years have seen a veritable renaissance in Adam Smith scholarship. Most is devoted to revising a previously widespread image of him, especially within libertarian circles, as an advocate of...
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Can Scotland Govern Itself?
Editor’s Note: This excellent post by Hans Eicholz on the need for the Scots to recover their former capitalist and free society enthusiasms if they are to govern themselves is worthy of...
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A Vindication of Commercial Society
In the Wealth of Nations Adam Smith outlines a commercial society: When the division of labour has been once thoroughly established, it is but a very small part of a man's wants which the produce of...
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To Adam Smith be True: A Conversation with Russ Roberts
Did you know that Adam Smith’s The Theory of Moral Sentiments can change your life? In essays on self-knowledge, happiness, virtue, being loved and being lovely, making the world a better place, and...
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Amateur Hour
KEENE, NH - SEPTEMBER 30 (Photo by Darren McCollester/Getty Images)A while ago, I was driving back to Indiana from the place of my birth and America’s most dysfunctional city, Chicago. As thoughts of...
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The Progress of Vanity
Teaching philosophy isn’t usually thought to go with an interest in fashion. For one thing, philosophers are hardly legendary for their sartorial flair. For another, someone might question why the...
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The Donald, the Impartial Spectator, and the Command of the Passions
Adam Smith statue in Edinburgh's High Street.I spend the better part of my professional life teaching “Great Books.” This semester’s lineup so far has included Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Second Discourse...
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Rousseau Contra Smith Revisited
Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Adam Smith have long been powerful symbols of two very different approaches to the 18th century Enlightenment: the one liberal, the other democratic; the one for individual...
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Rebuilding the Liberty Narrative: A Conversation with Gordon Lloyd
There is nothing more arduous than the apprenticeship of liberty, Tocqueville informs. While equality in modern democratic society is a natural tendency—one that grows without much effort—it is liberty...
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The Rule of (Pluralistic) Laws
In response to: Why Freedom Is a Legal Concept John Lilburne reading from Coke's Institutes at his trial for treason (c.1649). Steven Grosby’s rich Liberty Forum essay combines, as his writing always...
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Freedom Might Well Flourish Even If Conservatives Don’t
In response to: What Is the Future of Conservatism? Samuel Goldman has written a wide-ranging and thought-provoking Liberty Forum essay on the current sorry state of American conservatism. This sorry...
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Is It Really Commercial Activity that Civilizes?
Don’t let references to “the dismal science” fool you. Classical liberal economics is actually a pretty optimistic way to look at life. Liberals maintain that markets create wealth, promote mutual...
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Sit Hamilton, Sit! Now Stay! Good Hamilton.
In response to: Debating Alexander Hamilton’s Case for American Manufacturing Greatness Operating a specific enterprise, whatever its aim or product, requires focusing on measurable quantities of...
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Tariffs and the Politics of Bizarro World
gopixa/shutterstock.comOne knows it’s a strange, new political world in the US when Paul Krugman attacks a Republican President from the right on the subject of tariffs.
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What Was the Scottish Enlightenment?
Statue of David Hume on the Royal Mile, Edinburgh Without abolishing the individual, the Scottish Enlightenment nonetheless made solidarity basic to human existence.
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