Explore Freedom

Book Review: Basic Economics

by Richard M. Ebeling April 1, 2001

Basic Economics: A Citizen’s Guide to the Economy by Thomas Sowell (New York: Basic Books, 2000); 366 pages; $30. WHEN ADAM SMITH completed his criticisms of mercantilism, the 18th-century system of government planning and control, in The Wealth of Nations, he expressed a deep pessimism that the free-trade ideal that he had defended, instead of the regulated economy, would ever be ... [click for more]

Book Review: Global Fortune

by Richard M. Ebeling March 1, 2001

Global Fortune: The Stumble and Rise of World Capitalism edited by Ian Vasquez (Washington, D. C.: Cato Institute, 2000); 295 pages; $18.95 cloth; $9.95 paperback. IN SEPTEMBER 2000, David Henderson, a prominent free-market economist in Great Britain, delivered the annual Wincott Lecture at the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) in London. His theme was “Anti-Liberalism 2000.” Henderson detailed the wide and ... [click for more]

Book Review: The Mystery of Capital

by Richard M. Ebeling February 1, 2001

The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else by Hernando de Soto (New York: Random House, 2000); 243 pages; $24.95. CONSIDER THE TERM “the Third World.” Most people probably would conjure up in their minds the image of tens of millions of poverty-stricken people living in Asia, Africa, and South America possessing no means for ... [click for more]

Book Review: Feeling Your Pain

by Richard M. Ebeling January 1, 2001

Feeling Your Pain: The Explosion and Abuse of Government Power in the Clinton-Gore Years by James Bovard (St. Martin’s Press, 2000); 426 pages; $26.95. WHEN THE HISTORY of the last decade of the 20th century is written sometime in the future, chroniclers of the 1990s will probably, at first, be tempted to emphasize the apparent triumphs of freedom around ... [click for more]

Book Review: The Faces of Janus

by Richard M. Ebeling December 1, 2000

The Faces of Janus: Marxism and Fascism in the Twentieth Century by A. James Gregor (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2000); 240 pages; $30. IN 1947, Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises published a short book entitled Planned Chaos. He analyzed and put into perspective the intellectual and ideological forces that had been at work in the Western world since the ... [click for more]

Book Review: When in the Course of Human Events

by Richard M. Ebeling November 1, 2000

When in the Course of Human Events: Arguing the Case for Southern Secession by Charles Adams (Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000); 255 pages; $24.95. IN HER 1924 BOOK Free Trade and Peace in the Nineteenth Century, Helen Bosanquet pointed out, The conflict between Free Trade and Protection was one of the chief causes of the great Civil War.... Interests ... [click for more]

Book Review: The Tyranny of Good Intentions

by Richard M. Ebeling October 1, 2000

The Tyranny of Good Intentions: How Prosecutors and Bureaucrats Are Trampling the Constitution in the Name of Justice by Paul Craig Roberts and Lawrence M. Stratton (Roseville, Calif.: Prima Publishing, 2000); 240 pages; $24.95. IT OFTEN SEEMS that liberty is only really appreciated when it is either directly threatened or has been lost. In the 1930s, when liberty was challenged by ... [click for more]

Book Review: Power and Prosperity

by Richard M. Ebeling September 1, 2000

Power and Prosperity: Outgrowing Communist and Capitalist Dictatorships by Mancur Olson (New York: Basic Books, 2000); 233 pages; $28. MANCUR OLSON, who died in 1998 at the age of 62, was one of the most insightful economic analysts of the political process. His most original and important work was The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of ... [click for more]

Book Review: From Subsistence to Exchange and Other Essays

by Richard M. Ebeling August 1, 2000

From Subsistence to Exchange and Other Essays by Peter Bauer (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2000); 153 pages; $24.95. FREE-MARKET ECONOMIST Peter T. Bauer is 85 years old this year. During the 55 years since the end of the Second World War, Bauer has been one of the most articulate and insightful critics of economic planning and government intervention in the ... [click for more]

Book Review: Trust on Trial

by Richard M. Ebeling July 1, 2000

Trust on Trial: How the Microsoft Case Is Reframing the Rules of Competition by Richard B. McKenzie (Cambridge, Mass.: Perseus Publishing, 2000); 281 pages; $26. IN HIS 1942 BOOK, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, Joseph A. Schumpeter argued, “The fundamental impulse that set and keeps the capitalist engine in motion comes from the new consumers’ goods, the new methods of production or ... [click for more]

Book Review: 15 Great Austrian Economists

by Richard M. Ebeling June 1, 2000

15 Great Austrian Economists edited by Randall G. Holcombe (Auburn, Ala.: Ludwig von Mises Institute, 1999); 258 pages; $15.95. TWENTY-SIX YEARS AGO, in June 1974, I was fortunate enough to be invited by the Institute for Humane Studies to be one of 40 people who attended a week-long conference on Austrian economics in South Royalton, Vermont. After a decades long hiatus, ... [click for more]

Book Review: The Invention of the Passport

by Richard M. Ebeling May 1, 2000

The Invention of the Passport: Surveillance, Citizenship and the State by John Torpey (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000); 210 pages; $19.95. One of the most stupendous achievements of 19th-century classical liberalism was the right of freedom of movement. As one indication, between 1840 and the early decades of the 20th century almost 60 million people emigrated from Europe to other ... [click for more]