David Boaz on his Very Fine New Book

If the video does not appear above, click here.

Bastiat's "The Law" and "What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen" in Kurdish

Available at fine Kurdish bookstores near you…or by downloading the PDF.

Also available in Georgian

and in Nepali

and in Azeri

Oh, and in English

and in French

and many other languages.

If you haven’t read it, you should.

Paper on Globalization and Governance

Coming Soon to an Academic Portuguese-Language
Bookstore Near You!

I gave a paper at a conference on governance at the University of Aveiro, Portugal in 2006 and it’s about to appear in the book that resulted from the conference. (I also debated the leader of the Left Bloc in the Portuguese parliament and did, I think, rather well, as he seemed not to understand the concept of “evidence.”)

Here’s the paper in English.

The Debate:

Thanks to André Azevedo Alves for the invitation, the book, and the whole experience!

New Teaching Resource

The Online Library of Liberty Reading Lists

The Mind of the Market: Compassionate Apes, Competitive Humans, and Other Tales from Evolutionary Economics

Exit Rights and Social Contracts

My chapter on “No Exit: Framing the Problem of Justice” from Ordered Anarchy: Jasay and His Surroundings (ed. by Hartmut Kliemt and Hardy Bouillon; London: Ashgate, 2008) is now available as a PDF. Comments welcomed.

Boudreaux on Globalization!!! Its Grreeaat!

I just got Don Boudreaux’s book Globalization. It’s a good read and full of evidence and clear-headed analysis.

No Exit: Framing the Problem of Justice

My essay on the “exit closure” and the social contractarian theory of John Rawls just came out in a book edited by Hardy Bouillon and Hartmut Kliemt, Ordered Anarchy: Jasay and His Surroundings (Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing, 2007).

The book has some very interesting chapters, which I’m looking forward to reading. (My chapter, “No Exit: Framing the Problem of Justice,” should be available soon on this humble website as a downloadable PDF.

Arabic Edition of "In Defense of Global Capitalism" Reviewed in Al Hayat

The Arabic edition of In Defense of Global Capitalism by Johan Norberg has been reviewed in a number of Arabic papers, but today the prestigious Al Hayat ran its review.

Google Books Rocks!

I’m working on a lecture to deliver in Hamburg on “Freedom Properly Understood,” so I’ve been reading up on various theories of “positive freedom,” including Amartya Sen’s Development as Freedom and, naturally, the works of Thomas Hill Green. I wanted to find his “Lecture on Liberal Legislation and Freedom of Contract” but did not have it in my editions of his works. I figured I’d have to trek to a library and spend a half a day getting a copy. Then… I thought I’d check Google Books. I’ve just finished printing chapter from the facsimile of the 1906 edition. Eureka!

“The danger of legislation, either in the interests of a privileged class or for the promotion of particular religious opinions, we may fairly assume to be over. The popular jealousy of law, once justifiable enough, is therefore out of date. The citizens of England now make its law. We may ask them by law to put a restraint on themselves in the matter of strong drink. We ask them further to limit, or even altogether to give up, the not very precious liberty of buying and selling alcohol, in order that they may become more free to exercise the faculties and improve the talents which God has given them.”

Ugh.

An Elegant Treatment of Twentieth Century Collectivism

David Boaz judiciously reviews Wolfgang Schivelbusch’s excellent bookThree New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt’s America, Mussolini’s Italy, and Hitler’s Germany, 1933–1939 in Reason: “Hitler, Mussolini, Roosevelt — What FDR had in common with the other charismatic collectivists of the 30s.”

Is the Welfare State Justified?

I had the pleasure of interviewing Daniel Shapiro, an old friend and author of a very important new book, at an Institute for Humane Studies function on Friday. The book is Is the Welfare State Justified? and it’s just been published by Cambridge University Press.

It’s the only sustained response of its kind to political philosophers and theorists who believe that the welfare state is justified because they uphold egalitarianism, or “prioritarianism” (that is, that priority should be given to the worst off among us), or “positive rights,” or “communitarianism.” Shapiro does not take issue with those values or commitments. Instead, he argues that the welfare state does not serve those principles well and that market-based institutions would do a better job of providing the benefits that are merely assumed to be provided by the welfare state. Shapiro’s book is very important and very well done. As a part of his case, he makes two very, very shocking claims (shocking among political philosophers, at least): 1) institutions matter, and not only aspirations; 2) facts matter.

This is a book worth buying.

(Slight caveat: it’s occasionally a bit challenging and not the most riveting of works, not because of the complexity of the argument, but because he’s very thorough; there are parts that deserve sustained and focused attention and parts that can be read a bit more lightly.)

The Delightful Lev Rubinstein

Lev Rubinstein at the Cato.ru Seminar

At one of the dinners during the Cato.ru Summer School, poet Lev Rubinstein read from his essays (in Russian). It was utterly delightful. (My reactions were delayed by a few seconds as I listened to the translation.) His sense of play and his libertarian spirit nicely complemented the serious discussions of economics, political theory, and other topics that had dominated the day. I was honored to receive an autographed copy of his book Catalogue of Comedic Novelties, which I’ve greatly enjoyed.

More on Rubinstein here. Rubinstein will speak at Georgetown University November 7.

On Liberty Now Available in Arabic

Thanks to the hard work of Fadi Haddadin, Ghaleb Hijazi, and our other Arab colleagues, John Stuart Mill’s classic work On Liberty is now available in Arabic, through the Cato Institute’s Arabic Lamp of Liberty and Dar Al Ahlia.

Another Package of Insights from Tyler Cowen

I just finished Tyler Cowen’s enlightening new book, Discover Your Inner Economist. It’s a good antidote to the “isn’t economics weirdly counter-intuitive” genre, which, although often fun, doesn’t do as much to advance economic literacy as some seem to think. Discover Your Inner Economist is full of interesting ideas about such issues as self-deception, why some incentives work in certain settings, but not in others, and why wonderful restaurants may be hard to find in wealthy countries. It’s also full of lots of Tyler’s unique personality, which I happen to find interesting. (But…not everyone will be as enchanted by his informed discussions of his passions, such as tasty food, so for a few sections it may be worth taking his advice about reading books [pp. 61-66].)

Hayek Now in Print in Arabic

F. A. Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom (the condensed edition) is now in print in Arabic. Thanks to the whole Misbah al Hurriyya team!

Religious People Should Think About Testing Their Faith

I’m about done with Christopher Hitchens’ God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. It’s got some flaws (including a number of errors, none of which — so far, at least — have been central or very important to his case), but it’s also one of the best books on religion I’ve read in a while. Hitchens is a really fine stylist (he seems to write very quickly, which accounts both for his wit and his occasional errors of fact) and his assault gives no quarter. He addresses metaphysics, arguments from design, textual integrity and history, arguments from utility and morality, and more. I recommend this book especially to the religious; if anyone can keep his or her faith in revealed religion unshaken and intact after reading this book, then, well, it’s a testament to something.

I’ll write something more thoughtful on the topic later tonight or tomorrow night.

Johan Norberg in Arabic and in Russian

I’m so pleased to have in my hands the elegant, beautiful, and elegantly printed Arabic and Russian editions of Johan Norberg’s book, In Defense of Global Capitalism. They are beautiful. Just beautiful.

The Russian edition is co-published by Cato.ru and Novoe Izdatelstvo and the Arabic edition is co-published by Misbahalhurriyya.org (Cato’s Arabic imprint) and Dar Al Ahliya.

(The Russian-language essay contest organized around the book has yielded a lot of entrants, most of which came in on June 15; it seems that Russian students are much like American students, in that they wait until the last day to submit their essays.)

George Will on Brink Lindsey on America's libertarianism

George Will has a deeply intelligent review/appreciation/critique of Brink Lindsey’s truly fine new book, The Age of Abundance: How Prosperity Transformed America’s Politics and Culture, in today’s New York Times Book Review: “Land of Plenty: What makes Americans different? The Cato Institute’s Brink Lindsey has some ideas.”

Excerpts from Brink’s book, which is rich and interesting and very provocative, have been run recently as the cover story in a recent Cato Policy Report (“How Prosperity Made Us More Libertarian”) and as the cover story in this month’s Reason magazine. (You’ve got to get a copy of Reason to read the essay; it won’t be online for another month.)

Lamp of Liberty Books

Misbah al Hurriyya (the Lamp of Liberty) is publishing Johan Norberg’s excellent book In Defense of Global Capitalism. It will be off the presses by June 5.

Cato.ru has also published an edition in Russian, now available online, which is the basis for an essay contest.

A Smear Job at the NYT

I’ve read Brian Doherty’s book Radicals for Capitalism cover-to-cover. I’ve blogged on it and taken part in an online debate occasioned by the book. (Note that the back-and-forth is in “The Conversation.”)

So I know something about the book. Today’s New York Times carries a review. I don’t expect reviewers to applaud every book and I certainly don’t expect them to agree with the author’s substantive views. But I also don’t expect a smear job, which is what David Leonhardt delivered in “Free for All.” My colleague David Boaz does a thorough job of responding to the smears in “NYT Clueless on Libertarianism.”

A Great Read

I’m about 1/3 of the way through Brian Doherty’s excellent Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement. I had read a few chapters in manuscript form and have been looking forward to the work for some years. I’m pleased to say that the wait has been worth it. I’ll write more about it soon (after I’ve finished the whole 718 pages of text, of course.)

A New Book

I read a number of the early chapters and provided feedback and information — and now I get to read the book. Brian Doherty’s Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement should be interesting and entertaining.

Understand the Wealth of Nations! Really!

Buy this Book

It’s been many years since I read the whole An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. It is full — full — of wonderful and interesting ideas. And it’s sometimes mind numbingly boring.

P. J. O’Rourke has a great new introduction to the book, On the Wealth of Nations. Buy it. Read it. Enjoy it.

Full Disclosure: I had some great conversations with P.J. when he was starting out on the work and he says some nice things about my assistance in the book.

McGovern and Polk's Disappointing Analysis and Plan

On my long flight, I read a short book, Out of Iraq: A Practical Plan for Withdrawal Now, by George McGovern and William R. Polk. It had been enthusiastically recommended by a friend whose judgement I value. (He’s a self-described “libertarian Democrat”—a lifelong Democrat who’s become convinced of the inherent worth and practical applicability of libertarian principles.) It was a disappointment. My friend had praised it for realistically cataloguing what would be involved in a U.S. withdrawal, including how much it would cost, how long it would take, etc. I am convinced that precisely such analysis, such realism, and such proposals are vital to the success of a disengagement plan. Unfortunately, most of the practical elements amount to a shopping list of how much the U.S. should pay an Iraqi government to revamp hospitals, infrastructure, etc., how much the U.S. should pay an Iraqi government to finance police forces, how much the U.S. should pay an Iraqi government to hire foreign troops to police the country while it gets its act in order, how much the U.S. should pay an Iraqi government to provide restitution to victims of U.S. military force, etc., etc. The numbers are all simply drawn out of a hat, with almost no evidence that the sums would suffice, that they would in fact cover the expenses, etc. Moreover, the logistical issues of a U.S. withdrawal are not even mentioned.

The analysis also suffers from a lack of documentation and from some really remarkably silly statements. The lack of documentation was irritating because they sometimes make assertions that seem unlikely or at least surprising, such as that “city moneylenders” under the British-backed monarchy were responsible for “driving down” “their Shia fellow tribesmen into serfdom.” (There are also a number of garbled statistical claims and historically or demographically sloppy claims that should have been corrected, such as the claim that all of the Kurds are Muslims, when in fact there are non-Muslim Kurdish minorities, and that “Shiis (Arabic ‘partisans’) differ from Sunnis in being influenced by ancient Persian religion and coming from a different historical and social background.”) Moreover, they rest too much of their argument on the dubious claim that the insurgency was entirely a response to U.S. violence, notably a case of firing on demonstrators [‘Their demand was basic — food.’], that that demonstration “triggered the first serious attack in American forces” and that “That was the beginning of the Iraqi insurgency.” No mention of the role of Ba’athist officers, weapons dumps, and hundreds of millions of dollars looted from the national bank, nor of the involvement of nearby states. Al Qaeda in Iraq is completely dismissed as unimportant, despite the role it played in deliberately provoking violent conflict between Sunni and Shia Arabs, most spectacularly in February with the destruction of the shrine at Samarra. The point is not that real anger at outrages or mistakes or criminal action by U.S. forces was irrelevant or unimportant, but that McGovern and Polk have written what amounts to a mere mirror-image of the neo-conservative defenses of the war, a one-sided defense of the insurgents.

What is needed to make the case is a clear account by someone who understands military logistics, has a realistic approach to hard choices (i.e., making a choice among a number of options, all of which have problems), and can present a clear argument for U.S. withdrawal.

For fun, I’m reading and enjoying Anthony Everitt’s Augustus.

UPDATE: Apologies for the grammatical mess of this post when I first posted it; that’s what comes from being exhausted, dealing with jet lag, and having an internet connection that kept booting me off whenever I tried to save the posting.

The Knight in the Panther's Skin

I’m pleased to have been introduced on this trip to the great Georgian epic poem by Shota Rustaveli, The Knight in the Panther’s Skin, which I bought yesterday at a street market in Tbilisi in English and French translation. (Here is an online prose translation by Marjory Scott Wardrop. The English translation that I bought is in hexameter verse and was translated by Venera Urushadze. It came out after Wardrop’s prose translation.)

I’ve read or reread a number of such epics in recent years, such as the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Iliad and the Odyssey, the Aeneid, the Mabinogian, Beowulf, the Niebelungenlied, Heimskringla and Gylfaginning, the Kalevala, and so on, and I’m greatly looking forward to The Knight in the Panther’s Skin.

Andrew Sullivan at His Best

I’ve heard Andrew Sullivan give roughly the same talk — on the rise of “Christianism,” on the related growth of a politics without doubt, and on the bankruptcy of modern conservatism — three times over the last six weeks, and the third time was the very best. It was the presentation of his brand new book The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It, How to Get It Back at the Cato Institute, which was followed by an outstandingly intelligent discussion/debate with commentator David Brooks, columnist for the New York Times and author of Bobos in Paradise and other books.

Particularly sharp was the debate between Sullivan and Brooks toward the end. Sullivan lit into the Republican Congress and presidency for its grossly irresponsible expansion of federal spending and Brooks responded that, true as that may be (and he’s hardly as exercised about it as Sullivan is), it can’t be ascribed to the influence of “Christianist” religious certainty. Sullivan shot back that it was the reliance on the religious right that has kept the current crop of “crooks” in power, as they shovel money out the door to every special interest in the nation, and that Karl Rove & Co. have maintained their grip on power by marching their backers to the voting booths to vote for virtue against vice, patriotism agains treason, God against Satan.

I don’t fully agree with Andrew — or maybe I think he has the emphasis just a bit off — when he puts so much emphasis on doubt as a fundamental feature of a truly liberal political order. (Not all structures have to be infinitely iterated, so it’s not reasonable to be as doubtful about the importance of doubt as it is to be doubtful about this or that particular claim, for example. The adage “Moderation in all things” does not itself have to be applied moderately. Similarly, it seems to me that a liberal politics of doubt and process, rather than certainty and result, has nonetheless to rest on some deep certainties, such as that individuals have rights and that power should be limited. But in the context of Bushian and conservative insistence on the virtual treason of doubting their authority, an Oakeshottian emphasis on uncertainty and doubt is certainly a good antidote to the arrogance of power.) The whole brilliant event can be watched or listened to here.

More Posturing

Christopher Buckley’s review of The Definitive Book of Body Language in the New York Times (requires registration) is outstandingly clever. (Body language is the new craze; President Bush said today that he’ll be observing the body language of presidents Musharraf and Karzai during their dinner at the White House tonight, in order to guage the degree of tension between the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan.)

A Couple of New Books

Among my responsibilities at the Cato Institute, I read most of our new books (ideally, before publication, since it never hurts to have more eyes catching errors, glitches, and infelicities of expression) and write the memos with which they’re sent to our sponsors and friends. The two most recent are especially clear and interesting.

[T]he book is actually quite good. I�d happily recommend it to anyone with a basic grasp on health care and a desire to learn a bit more about Medicare. Hyman is a felicitous and fun writer, and he conveys an impressive amount of history and data in as accessible and absorbable a manner as one could hope. I know how tricky it is to make health care a quick and gripping read, and I tip my hat to anyone who is capable of enriching the debate and educating readers by doing so.

Hyman does a great job of explaining how the Medicare system works — and that actually is a remarkable accomplishment.

The other is Buck Wild: How Republicans Broke the Bank and Became the Party of Big Government, by my colleague Steve Slivinski. It’s a great read and full of insights.

So many accounts of goings-in in D.C. focus on corruption, with the implication that bags of cash are regularly handed to members of Congress. As we learned from the case of California Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (now behind bars), that does sometimes happen. But itââ?‰?¢s actually pretty rare. What is overlooked in most accounts is the truly pervasive forms of corruption, the type that really is business-as-usual. Votes are bought and sold, not for diamond rings and fancy condos, but for government spending in their states or districts, for subsidies to favored constituents, for unnecessary government purchases that conveniently include components manufactured in the districts of the politicians making the decisions. Occasionally the lid is taken off the process and we can see exactly how itââ?‰?¢s done. Steve describes how Pennsylvania Rep. Bud Shuster got more money for his favorite pork barrel spending: highway construction. In that case, the incriminating evidence was revealed to the public by then-representative and now-senator Tom Coburn. On page 97 of Buck Wild, Steve quotes a message left by one of Shusterââ?‰?¢s aids on the voicemail of Coburnââ?‰?¢s staff assistant, which Coburn copied and released to the media:

“We have a deal on the funding levels for [the highway bill]. I originally spoke to your boss, to your office, last September and we had notified you that there was $10 million in the bill for your boss. Weââ?‰?¢re upping that by $5 million, so you have $15 million, and Iââ?‰?¢m just trying to figure out where you want to put the new money, the new $5 million.”

Thatââ?‰?¢s the corruption that is almost never discussed. Log-rolling (if you vote for my special-interest handout, Iââ?‰?¢ll vote for yours) among members and the bribery of the public by politicians, who openly buy votes in exchange for “bringing home the bacon,” that is, taking money from others to give to constituents and supporters. Itââ?‰?¢s what the late Senator Barry Goldwater called “government by bribe.” As one of my very favorite economists, Frederic Bastiat, neatly explained the process: “Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else.” Of course, itââ?‰?¢s not possible for everyone to live at the expense of everyone else, and, as Steve explains so clearly, the great majority of us lose in that game.

Economic Freedom of the World Study Released

The Economic Freedom of the World: 2006 Annual Report was released today (well, it’s 12:20 am, so technically yesterday). It’s well worth a careful read. The charts relating economic freedom with life expectancy, economic growth, unemployment, infant mortality, child labor, and other measures of well being are especially eye-opening. The accompanying essay by William Easterly is also quite insightful.

The whole book can be downloaded, along with all of the charts, data, descriptions of the method, etc.

The Cato Institute publishes the book in the U.S., but most of the heavy lifting is done by the great folks at the Fraser Institute. The document is also being promoted by the Cato Institute in Russian, Arabic, and Spanish.

Cowboy Capitalism in Russian

Thanks to the good offices of the IRISEN project in Russia (on whose editorial board I serve), Olaf Gersemann’s outstanding book Cowboy Capitalism: European Myths, American Reality has appeared in a href="http://www.irisen.ru/gers-ko.html">Russian edition. Brink Lindsey’s insightful Against the Dead Hand: The Uncertain Struggle for Global Capitalism has also appeared in a Russian edition.

A Little Reading

I took some time off to run some errands today and to do some reading. I finished Naguib Mahfouz’s story The Day the Leader Was Killed, which I found both eye-opening (for insights into how personal and familial relationships are shaped by societal norms and economic necessities) and a bit opaque, as it seemed to require more knowledge of twentieth century Egyptian political history than I possess. It did induce me to buy several of his other novels and stories, however.

I also stumbled on the recently released English-edition of Robert Musil’s Nachlass zu Lebzeiten, which offers a fine sampling of the great author’s essays. Peter Wortsman’s translation, Posthumous Papers of a Living Author, is quite good.

Here’s a little sample, from “A Man Without Character,” in which Musil notes of literature that,

Novels contain descriptions of the most amazing modes of behavior for countless situations. The main drawback, however, is that the situations you actually get yourself into never accord altogether with those for which the novels have prescribed what to do and what to say. World literature is a huge depot in which millions of souls are dressed up with magnanimity, indignation, pride, love, disdain, jealousy, nobility, and meanness. If a worshipped woman steps on our feelings, we know that we are to reply with a reproachfully soulful look; if a scoundrel mistreats an orphan, we know that we are to knock him out with a single punch. But what are we to do if the worshipped woman slams her door shut in our face so that our soulful look never reaches her? Or if a table laden with costly crystal separates us from the scoundrel mistreating the orphan? Shall we break the door down to cast our sensitive look through splinters; and should we carefully remove the costly crystal before resorting to the indignant blow? In such truly crucial situations, literature always leaves you in the lurch; maybe things will only get better in a few hundred years, when more facets of life are described.

For fun I’ve been reading Nicholas Ostler’s fascinating and remarkable Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World. I’m only a bit more than 200 pages into a 600 page book, but every page has been a treat.

The Art of Comics

I’m commissioning some illustrated novels (comic books) about liberty in the Arabic language with some talented and experienced creators of comic books in the Middle East. In order to understand the medium better, today I bought Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, by Scott McCloud. It’s full of quite interesting ideas about art and ideas and, what’s more, artfully uses the medium of the comic book to explain them.

Why Orwell Matters

I recently finished Christopher Hitchens’s very fine book Why Orwell Matters.

It’s a good read and I recommend it highly. As I’m blogging from an airport just before boarding, I’ll quickly mention two flaws, one minor and the other rather serious.;

The first is the in-joke character of some of the discussion of squabbles among now forgotten intellectuals, some of which may be best left forgotten. Nonetheless, Hitchens manages to drag some of them out of their deserved obscurity in a manner that is at times enlightening and often entertaining.

The second is a more serious failing in a book that excoriates various writers for their blindness to or active collaboration with various forms of totalitarian violence, notably Stalinism. In the same book in which he points out the beams in the eyes of others, Hitchens reveals the enormous splinter in his own, as the following sentences reveal:

“[H]e [Orwell] was in contact with the small and scattered forces of the independent international Left — forces now largely forgotten, but containing important individuals who witnessed at a critical time, and at immense risk, to the menace of totalitarianism. The generic name for this movement was Trotskyist….” (p. 62) “There will always be Trotskys and Goldsteins and even Winstson Smiths, but it must be clearly understood that the odds are overwhelmingly against them, and that as with Camus’s rebel, the crowd will yell with joy to see them dragged to the scaffold.” (p. 191)

Leon Trotsky was an architect of the Soviet terror state and personally participated in many of the murders, “liquidations,” and other horrors of that regime. He lost in the power struggle with Stalin, but there is no reason at all to think that, had he been the winner, the regime would have been any less horrifying.

That rather glaring problem having been noted, I can recommend the book highly.

One of the Most Fascinating Books I've Read in Years

I’ve just finished Tom Reiss’s outstanding and truly gripping work of biographical scholarship: The Orientalist: Solving the Mystery of a Strange and Dangerous Life. I got it after finishing Ali and Nino, by “Kurban Said,” aka “Essad Bey,” aka “Lev Nussimbaum.” Ali and Nino, much of which is set in Baku, was given to me there by my friend Tural. It’s a brilliant book. Another young Azeri just brought me three copies in Russian for some friends and I am currently reading it in a German edition (the language in which it was written) that I bought when I was in Germany recently. My advice: read Ali and Nino before reading The Orientalist.

I should add that not only are these two books deeply interesting for what they say about identity, about love, and about other matters, but both are very much about liberty, about the terrible destructiveness of totalitarian socialism, and about one man’s doomed search for freedom during one of the most confusing, dangerous, and murderous periods in recent history.

Books in Iraqi Kurdistan

I’m pleased to write that I have been sent confirmation that the shipment of books we sent from the Cato Institute to the four university libraries of Iraqi Kurdistan have arrived at their destinations. They went from Baltimore by ship, were delivered to Aqaba, where they were picked up and taken by truck through Iraq and delivered to the libraries, which are now cataloguing them and putting them on the library shelves.

I’m very grateful to my colleagues in the U.S., Jordan, and Iraq for all the hard work and persistence that they dedicated to providing students and scholars with some valuable tools that will help to create free, open, and prosperous societies. I hope soon to make similar shipments available to libraries in other countries throughout the region. As our network expands, we should be able to make yet more books available. (We plan to ship books that are published in English or French, and to publish more books in the region in Arabic, Farsi, Kurdish, and Azeri.)

Bourgeois Virtues

Ok, It’s Not an Appropriate Illustration, but It’s Provocative

Deirdre McCloskey has a new essay out on “Bourgeois Virtues” in the latest Cato Policy Report. It’s a short extract from her forthcoming book Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce.

A Great Love Story and a Fascinating Look at the Fulcrum of Europe and Asia

Last night I finished a truly excellent book, which I received as a gift from a friend in Baku. Not only did I learn a great deal from it, but I enjoyed every minute that I spent reading it. It’s Ali and Nino, by the mysterious Kurbain Said, who was recently shown to be none other than Lev Nussimbaum, aka Assad Bey, a man who grew up Jewish in Baku, converted to Islam, presented himself in Berlin as a Muslim prince, and died in poverty in 1942 in Italy after the Nazis discovered his Jewish background.

I’m not up to writing a full review of the work, but I can say that it is at once a gripping love story and an exploration of life at the fulcrum between Europe and Asia, the Southern Caucasus. Kurban Said’s treatment of the interaction between European enlightenment ideas and traditional Islamic metaphysics and betwen Christian and Muslim attitudes to gender, family, and honor is insightful and perceptive. His description of the interaction between the ethnic groups of the region (and the horrible animosities among them that have persisted to the present, especially between Armenians and Azeris) is fascinating, as is his treatment of the creation of identity, something that was obviously central to his own life, for he did not merely receive or inherit his identity, but actively fashioned it. Moreover, the turbulent events of the First World War, Azerbaijan’s brief independence, and the Soviet invasion are brilliantly described.

Ali and Nino is a wonderful book. I recommend it most highly. (And my deep gratitude to Tural, for introducing me to the book! I have since bought copies for others who I think will also benefit from it.)

(I remembered that last year I read a review of a recent biography of the author, Tom Reiss’s The Orientalist: Solving the Mystery of a Strange and Dangerous Life. Now that I’ve read Said’s book, I’ve ordered the biography.)

The Faces of Lev Nussimbaum, Essad Bey, Kurban Said

P.S. I’ve not blogged much lately, as I’ve been both very busy and rather ill. Fortunately, I’m recovering, thanks to medicine and sleep.

An Excellent Book!

I just finished Mancur Olson’s last book, Power and Prosperity and I’m pleased to report that it’s a real page-turner. I learned almost as much from it as I did from his classic work The Logic of Collective Action. Among its many valuable features, Power and Prosperity provides a very helpful theoretical account of the functioning of the Soviety economic system and the difficulties of transitioning to free markets. The treatment of the role of “encompassing interests” and the transition from roving banditry to stationary banditry (autocracy) and from stationary banditry to democratic liberalism was also quite helpful and drew on his earlier work on collective action. (I may blog a longer essay on the topic, but…it’s late. So that will wait for a day or two. I’ll also add some critical remarks on his theory of collective action, which is rich with insights, but could use a dose of Anthony de Jasay’s insights from his book Social Contract, Free Ride.)

As usual, I’ve got a number of other books going. I just picked up and found quite engrossing Neal Ascherson’s Black Sea, through which I hope to become better informed about and better able to understand the politics of the region (e.g., the conflict between Georgia and Abkhazia, which is one among many conflicts that cannot be understood without a better grasp of the history of the region than I have at present).

(Note: Power and Prosperity has the unfortunate subtitle “Outgrowing Communist and Capitalist Dictatorships,” which doesn’t really make much sense. But don’t let that put you off the book.)

The History of Religious Toleration and Freedom

Perez Zagorin’s new book How the Idea of Religious Toleration Came to the West is excellent. I recommend it highly. I learned a good deal from it, especially concerning the context for various debates over religious toleration and freedom, and was introduced to elements of the story with which I was previously unfamiliar. Now, when the issue of toleration is on the front pages of most newspapers around the world, a knowledge of how religious toleration emerged in previously intolerant societies is of the greatest importance. (One helpful element was his treatment of the relationship between “toleration” and “freedom.”)

A weakness of the book, in my humble opinion, was the lack of any discussion of the role of the Spanish Scholastics (most especially Francisco de Vitoria, who, in his 1539 book De Indis defended the rights of the inhabitants of the “new world” not to be baptized against their wills. (That, however, is easily corrected — by reading Vitoria.)

I recommend reading this book along with R. I. Moore’s The Formation of a Persecuting Society: Power and Deviance in Western Europe, 950-1250, which gives a good picture of how persecution worked in Europe.

I just started reading Bruce Bawer’s very chilling work While Europe Slept : How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within. Don’t read it if you hope to be able to fall asleep after you set it down.

Books for Iraqi University Libraries

As a part of the Cato Institute’s Jack Byrne Iniative for Middle East Liberty, my colleagues and I have been buying lots and lots and lots of books to send off to four universities in Iraqi Kurdistan. In addition, several publishers of libertarian books have donated copies for distribution. We were putting in book plates indicating the source of the donation (“A Gift of the Lamp of Liberty”) and directing readers to Cato’s Arabic Lamp of Liberty website and Cato’s English web site when a colleague took this photo.

A number of people donated the funds and the books for the project, including several who contacted me through this website. Thank you, one and all!

Excellent New Book from Richard Epstein

I had the pleasure of reading successive versions of the manuscript for Richard Epstein’s little gem of a book, How Progressives Rewrote the Constitution, and yesterday I saw the fireworks when it was officially unveiled. Critical comments were provided by Professor Michael Seidman of the Georgetown University Law Center. (You can watch or hear the event here. Epstein’s Wall Street Journal smackdown of the administration’s grab for powers not authorized by the Constitution is available here. His interview on CNN on the issue is available here.)

How Progressives Rewrote the Constitution makes for a great short read; itââ?‰?¢s an intelligent and insightful tour through American constitutional history from the Constitutional Convention to last yearââ?‰?¢s terrible Kelo decision, in which the Supreme Court put their stamp of approval on the coercive transfer of property from disfavored private owners to favored private owners, despite the Constitutionââ?‰?¢s clear limitation of takings to “public use.” Epstein both demonstrates what has gone wrong and offers a coherent vision of constitutionally limited government that is attractive and even stirring.

Unsurprisingly for anyone who is acquainted with his work, Epstein offers both a historical treatment of constitutional law and a philosophical and legal/interpretative framework for how to read and apply the Constitution. As he notes of the “Progressives,”

They saw in constitutional interpretation the opportunity to rewrite a Constitution that showed at every turn the influence of John Locke and James Madison into a different Constitution, which reflected the wisdom of the leading intellectual reformers of their own time.

The Constitution written by the framers and amended over the years was replaced, not simply amended, by people motivated by a robust faith in the power of coercion to do good. As Epstein shows, the Progressive vision was based on a set of poorly supported social theories that led them to promote “the deadly combination of a narrow conception of individual liberty and a broad conception of government police power.” How Progressives Rewrote the Constitution offers an elegant and short introduction to American constitutional law (with clear explanations of such concepts as strict scrutiny, rational basis, police power, and so on) and a vigorous defense of the constitutional system of limited government.

If you like this book (and I�m sure you will), you might also want to get another book from the Cato Institute (co-published with Princeton University Press), Randy Barnett�s Restoring the Lost Constitution. (You can order How Progressives Rewrote the Constitution and Restoring the Lost Constitution by calling 800-767-1241 or by visiting www.catostore.org.)

The Worst Book I've Read in Years

The book was recommended by someone I respect. I had enjoyed greatly one of his earlier books. So I was looking forward to John Lukacs’s new book Democracy and Populism: Fear and Hatred.

The book is rambling, unfocused, incoherent, and deeply offensive to standards of evidence and argumentation. It’s full of glaring historical errors. I hated almost every minute of the experience of reading it. I also know why some others have reviewed it so favorably. There’s something to please just about everybody, from Catholic conservatives, who will like his attacks on the involvement of the laity in the church and his railing against gay marriage (it seems that since the 1980s, “more and more people insisted that the legal [and sacramental] institution of marriage be extended to them”; besides gay people, whom does he mean by “more and more people”? ), to luddite radicals, who will keen to his rants against mechanization and “fields…plowed by monstrous machines and made artificially fertile through sometimes poisonous chemicals,” to libertarians, who will like his fulminations against the decision to go to war with Iraq and his attacks on modern conservatives for claiming to be for smaller government while supporting Pentagon spending with nary a peep of skepticism, to Michael Moore fans, who will like his comparison of George W. Bush to Hitler.