Did Adam Smith—celebrated hero of free trade—make a big exception for reasons of national defense? Would he support the Jones Act of today? Caleb Petitt argues that a careful reading of Smith on the ...

Crypto- anarchism is a philosophy whose advocates think technology can assist them in creating communities based on consent rather than coercion.

The socialist calculation debate revolves around the question of whether central planners can, at least in principle, make the economic calculations necessary to achieve the rational, efficient ...

Why such a contradiction? Because he is frequently used as a boogeyman to be trotted out against “do- nothing- ism” when a crisis emerges. Depicted as a passive actor with regard to both the onset of ...

The Sanskrit Arthashastra, a manual for establishing a prosperous state written in ancient India by Kautilya, articulates many principles that would later become the foundations of modern economics.

The right of revolution, according to classical liberal thinkers, is derived from the natural right of self- preservation. Because the purpose of government is to protect individuals against assaults ...

Free trade means the exchange of goods and services across international borders, unhindered by government tariffs, quotas, or other restrictions. Since the publication of The Wealth of Nations by ...

Edmund Burke, an Irish- born British politician and philosopher, served in the House of Commons for almost 30 years and authored an extensive and influential body of speeches and books. Conventionally ...

While Karl Marx hated Pierre- Joseph Proudhon and his philosophy of mutualism, a libertarian can find in it much to appreciate.

Arthur George (A. G.) Gaston was born on July 4, 1892, in Demopolis, Alabama. Shortly after Gaston’s birth, he was sent off to be raised by his grandmother. His father had passed away and his mother ...

A libertarian world won’t eliminate all poverty, but it offers powerful tools for greatly reducing it, and improving the lives of the poorest and least privileged.

John Stuart Mill was born on May 20th, 1806, in London. John’s father, James Mill, was an ardent reformer and personal friend of Jeremy Bentham, the famous utilitarian philosopher. James Mill was ...