[ An Austrian Perspective on the History of Economic Thought (1995)] One of the most powerful influences in the legal and political thought and institutions of the Christian West during the Middle Ages was the Roman law, derived from the republic and empire of ancient Rome. Roman law classically developed in the 1st to the 3rd centuries AD.
Libertarianism is both old and new. It is rooted in ancient ideas of natural justice, fairness, peace, and cooperation. You could even say that any civilized society is already somewhat libertarian. After all, civilization requires peace and cooperation, which imply respect for others’ rights. This is what the libertarian seeks. To be sure, there
[ No Treason , no. 1, was first printed in 1867, just after the American Civil War. An MP3 audio file of this article, narrated by Brad O’Connell, is available for download .] The question of treason is distinct from that of slavery, and it is the same that it would have been if free states, instead of slave states, had seceded. On the part of
Legal requirements and prudence require most adults to carry various insurance policies. Although we may often take insurance for granted, it serves a valuable social function. Beyond its standard role recognized by all economists, insurance plays an important part in many Austrolibertarian proposals for privatizing traditionally state-run
A major piece of financial news last week was billionaire Raj Rajaratnam’s conviction on 14 counts of securities fraud and conspiracy. Rajaratnam, founder of the hedge fund Galleon Group, was worth an estimated $1.8 billion in 2009. His conviction has pleased those who want the feds to crack down on “insider trading” and show the fat cats on Wall
“If employees are being systematically underpaid in a firm, there is an automatic incentive for other companies to bid them away.” Earlier this week, the Supreme Court unanimously threw out a massive class-action sexual-discrimination lawsuit against Walmart. By overruling a lower court’s decision, the Supreme Court raised the barrier to future
Without question, the legal system is the one facet of society that supposedly requires state provision. Even such champions of laissez-faire as Milton Friedman and Ludwig von Mises believed a government must exist to protect private property and define the “rules of the game.” However, their arguments focused on the necessity of law itself. They
[An MP3 audio file of this article, read by Steven Ng, is available for download .] In his superb analysis of democracy, Hans-Hermann Hoppe observes that “prime ministers and presidents are selected for their proven efficiency as morally uninhibited demagogues. Thus, democracy virtually assures that only bad and dangerous men will ever rise to the
[Excerpted from For a New Liberty (1973)] Compulsory labor permeates our legal and judicial structure. Thus, much-venerated judicial procedure rests upon coerced testimony . Since it is axiomatic to libertarianism that all coercion — in this case, all coerced labor — against everyone except convicted criminals be eliminated, this means that
[Transcribed from the Libertarian Tradition podcast episode “Clarence Darrow”] Clarence Darrow is best known today as the Chicago lawyer who defended John T. Scopes in the Scopes Monkey Trial in 1925. A character based loosely on him is played by Spencer Tracy in the 1960 movie version of the classic play about the Scopes trial, Inherit the Wind .
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.