Illegitimate Authority: Facing the Challenges of Our Time by Noam Chomsky, edited by C.J. Polychroniou Haymarket Books, 2023; x + 330 pp. Noam Chomsky is universally respected for his contributions to linguistics and to the philosophy of mind, but he is a “public intellectual” as well, and it is in the public arena that opinion about him is
Murray Rothbard is well-known as one of the greatest exponents of praxeology, which operates through a priori reasoning. He was careful, however, to distinguish praxeology from history. The latter could be studied only through empirical investigation. In this week’s column, I’d like to discuss some observations he makes about this in For a New
How States Think: The Rationality of Foreign Policy by John J. Mearsheimer and Sebastian Rosato Yale University Press, 2023; 304 pp. How States Think surprised me. John Mearsheimer is a well-known critic of American foreign policy, and his analysis of the Ukraine war has been deservedly influential. As result, I anticipated that this book would
The Times (London) Friday, March 26, 1999 Two cheers for Colonel Tony Benn Nato was set up to fight a war in Europe. The Red Army invades, Nato fights back; Turks fight for Norway, French fight for Greece. What an extraordinary irony it is that Nato should not, in the event, have had to fight any war in Europe, but then chose, after the Cold War,
This article by A.N. Wilson is highly significant, not only for his case against the Balkan intervention but also for his overall perspective on the costs of war. The Independent (UK) April 25, 1999 Was the Second World War worth 56 million lives? We had grown used to having a prime minister who was ignorant, but now a much more worrying thought
True Patriotism (A speech delivered at the Men’s Club of the Prospect Street Congregational Church in Cambridge, Mass., June 7, 1898) There are moments in every man’s life, in the life of every nation, when, under the excitement of passion, the simple truths which in common times are the foundation upon which the right order and conduct of life
Bin Laden’s objective,” I speculated to Hernando de Soto, Peru’s great author of The Other Path and now The Mystery of Capital , “is the expulsion of American interests from the Muslim world.” “No, no,” he replied, “it’s more than that. He wants American interests out of the whole Third World.” In this scenario, the pessimistic concern is not only
The terrorist attacks of September 11 along with the continuing attack on Afghanistan have softened many people’s stance on our cherished freedoms and have emboldened almost every politician in Washington to embrace new laws that severely curtail our liberty and right to privacy. Of course, all of these new laws and executive orders have been
[Chapter 2 of Accent on the Right (1968)] As in most disagreements, the current politico-economic controversy revolves around what’s right. And contrary to what a socialist or a libertarian usually thinks of his opponents, each is as convinced of his righteousness as the other. A consciously malevolent person is seldom found. That this contest as
[First published in 1953] Is world government truly an alternative to war? Certainly, if we listen to the advocates of world federation and read their literature and attempt to analyze their arguments. Platitudes and pious prating seem to run like a heavy thread through the fabric of the discussions and writings of many persons who seem to feel
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.