Wow.

The BBC reports on the opening of Octavian’s House!

Six New Projects Launched

It’s involved a lot of work from a lot of people, but the Cato Institute’s Center for Promotion of Human Rights is pleased to announce six new projects, involving seven languages, to promote libertarian ideas and policies around the world. The ideas of liberty are now being promoted by the Cato Institute in:

Arabic
Spanish
Russian
Kurdish
Persian
Chinese
Portuguese
French
English
and throughout Africa in English, Swahili, Portuguese, French, and Arabic

And…coming soon, Azeri!

(Cato is already working in one of the most hostile of environments: American universities.)

The projects involve book publishing, syndication of articles to newspapers and magazines, podcasting, websites, video, seminars for students, policy conferences, lecture tours, public forums, and much, much more.

I was in London last week and sat next to John Fund of the Wall Street Journal at the Stockholm Network dinner where I presented an award. He discussed our programs in his WSJ column:

While the Stockholm Network focuses on Europe, that doesn’t mean that free-market think tanks in developing countries are being ignored. This week the Cato Institute is launching a series of international Web sites to build support for the ideas of liberty and to promote the work of local think tanks. Web sites in French, Portuguese, Chinese, Kurdish, African languages and Persian will join existing Cato Web sites in Russian, Spanish and Arabic.

The project is the work of Tom Palmer, who 20 years ago as a young libertarian scholar smuggled photocopiers into the Soviet Bloc so dissidents could produce their own samizdat publications. “In many countries there is a clear need for private efforts not subject to or tied to any government entity,” he told me. “Clearly, the government-led efforts aren’t doing such a hot job of promoting the ideas of liberty at the moment.”

Free Order….in Portuguese

Home and Away

I’m at home long enough to get reacquainted with my girls (felines, both), do laundry, take care of lots of business, and then hit the road for Denver and then China, for a very full schedule. In the meantime, over a year of work will be unveiled on Wednesday, December 12. Watch Cato.org and this space!

(The conference on legal history and jurisprudence was great. A really nice break from all my other work.)

The Lamp of Liberty Re-Lit!

Thanks to the hard work, dedication, and intelligence of my colleagues Fadi Haddadin and Ghaleb Hijazi, and our Jordanian internet magicians, the Lamp of Liberty (MisbahalHurriyya.org) has a completely new look, brilliant new features, and much, much more to offer. (It was just relaunched today and it takes time to redirect all the servers around the world to the new site, but the new one should look like the image above. If not, wait a few hours; the photo at the top need not be the one of the lady with a camera; they rotate every minute.)

I am proud to be associated with such people.

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!

(It’s pretty awful stuff, though. As he concludes his attack on freedom (in the name of freedom),

“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.

Cato University Home Study Course Now Available

*

All 12 modules of the Cato University Home Study Course are now available in mp3 format. They can be purchased on CDs at the moment (and either played from the CDs or transferred to an iPod or other mp3 player) and soon via download.

(Information on the Cato University 2008 Summer School is also available. I haven’t finalized the schedule yet, but give me time…..)

*James Madison while jogging.

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!

Very Cool

I’m looking forward to flying on a lighter, cheaper-to-fuel, more luxurious Boeing 787! Imagine a firm in a highly state-subsidized industry thinking like this:

“Our journey began some six years ago when we knew we were on the cusp of delivering valuable new technologies that would make an economic difference to our airline customers,” Mike Bair, vice president and general manager of the 787 program, told the crowd.

Russian-Language Essay Contest

Cato.ru is now sponsoring an essay contest (all entries in the Russian language only) on themes raised in Johan Norberg’s excellent book, In Defense of Global Capitalism, which will be available in Russian online in April and in print in May. Essay winners will be awarded cash prizes and places in the Cato.rU summer school, to be held in Alushta, Crimea September 2 - 8. (The sessions will also be in Russian.)

My New Colleague

It’s nice finally to be able to announce publicly that Andrei Illarionov, one of Russia’s most outspoken friends of liberty, has joined the Cato Institute as a senior fellow. The announcement (English, Russian) has led to an enormous amount of coverage in Russia (English on Mosnews.com), as well as across the Russian blogosphere. Andrei will speak at the conference on “Freedom, Commerce, and Peace: A Regional Agenda” (English, Russian) that I’m organizing in Tbilisi later this month.

Middle Eastern Comic Book Art

Comics Are as Popular in the Arab World as Elsewhere
As a part of my research on new ways to convey ideas, I’ve been looking into the medium of the illustrated novel. My colleagues have made a deal for two “comic books” that, we hope, will effectively convey the ideas of freedom to readers of Arabic. That may lead to a lot more. (We’ll see.) In addition to the works of Scott McCloud, I have been directed by Arab friends to AK Comics and the interview with the principals behind the project on NPR. (They have a video version of their TV cartoon work, which is very action-oriented, here.) (I think that we’re going to go less with the “action hero” genre and more with the illustrated book of ideas, but we’re still looking at options.)

The radical enemies of toleration have been using the medium of illustrated novels for some time. I hope that my Arab libertarian friends can give them some competition.

A Tiny Piece of Good News...

Images from the Book of Kells

A medieval Irish manuscript has been discovered. Experts have dated the book as from 800-1000 of the Common Era. To learn why that’s such a pleasant thing to contemplate, read Thomas Cahill’s most entertaining book How the Irish Saved Civilization.

Next Stage in D.C. Right to Bear Arms Lawsuit

As a plaintiff in a lawsuit to vindicate our Second Amendment rights in the District of Columbia, I’m pleased to present the hard work our lawyer has done in this rather slow moving case, in the form of our latest legal brief.

Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution Now Available in Arabic

I’m pleased to say that my colleagues and I will be releasing to the public an elegant bi-lingual (with Arabic and English on facing pages) pocket edition of the American Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution on Capitol Hill this Thursday. The event, “Building Foundations for Freedom, Commerce, and Peace in the Middle East,” will be opened by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) and will also feature presentations by Zainab al-Suwaij of the American Islamic Congress and my humble self.

Free to Choose Videos in Arabic

Miltlon Friedman in Arabic

Thanks to the good offices of Bob Chitester, Milton Friedman, and the Granicus Corporation, all of whom made their products or their work available to us at no charge, an online-streaming video version of Milton Friedman’s famous television series, Free to Choose is now available at the Lamp of Liberty. (It’s in the video box in the lower left corner; Arabic text announcing it will be available shortly.)

In other good news, my colleagues have made great strides in syndicating the material on the Lamp of Liberty through Arabic newspapers, with the URL of the website listed in the byline to drive visitors to the site. (My colleagues with Cato.ru have also been doing the same quite successfully in Russia.)

I should also mention the diligence of my colleague Jude Blanchette and the hard work of our heroic volunteer web designers at P. J. Doland.com as ingredients in making this important work available to Arabic viewers.

Cato University 2006: July 26-30, St. Pete Beach, Florida

“In a word, as a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights.”

James Madison, “Property,” 1792

“Who among us can say she already makes the most productive or attractive possible use of her property? The specter of condemnation hangs over all property. Nothing is to prevent the State from replacing any Motel 6 with a Ritz-Carlton, any home with a shopping mall, or any farm with a factory.”

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, dissenting in the case of Kelo v. New London

This year’s Cato University will focus on property, understood through history, law, economics, and philosophy. The seminar’s theme was inspired by the atrocious Kelo decision of the Supreme Court. Scott Bullock, the lawyer for the Institute for Justice who argued the case, will be on the faculty, along with a distinguished group of scholars. The title and the ad are related to the forthcoming Cato book on property rights by Timothy Sandefur, who will be teaching at the seminar. That’s especially gratifying for me, since Tim attended Cato University when he was an undergraduate.
The Don CeSar Resort, where this year’s Cato University will be held

Lamp of Liberty's New Look

Thanks to long hours and lots of careful attention to detail on the part of my colleagues in this effort, the Lamp of Liberty (www.misbahalhurriyya.org) now has a new look, greatly improved features, and a lot more content (with even more in the pipeline). The plan is to launch an internet advertising campaign for the site this week. (The author’s list, including my own humble contributions, is growing.)

The effort is part of a wider outreach to the Arab world and the people and cultures of the middle east. We just received the first draf of a translation of Johan Norberg’s In Defense of Global Capitalism and quite other books are in the works.

Great Excitement in Iceland!

Egill Skallagr�­msson, as Depicted in a 17th Century Manuscript

I got an email today from Professor Jesse Byock, probably the world’s leading scholar of Norse culture (and author of the wonderful book Viking Age Iceland), who is undertaking a major archeological project at Mosfellsdale in Iceland. It seems that he and his team may have found the gravesite of the famous Egill SkallagrÃ?­msson, one of my favorite figures from Icelandic literature and the central figure in Egil’s Saga. The story is covered in an English-language article in Iceland Review Online and here (1, 2, 3) are three stories from the Icelandic press.

Egil was a remarkable man: a farmer, a pirate, a murderer, a drunkard, a loving husband and father, and a truly great poet. (His life is hardly representative of the average Icelander of his age and was notable for its extraordinary violence.) Here is one of my favorite poems by Egil, as presented in Egil’s Saga:

Alone I fought eight men, Twice took on eleven,
I carved the wolf’s carrion
And killed them all:
Blows battered the shield,
Blades clashed,
My hard hand
Hurled the steel-flash.

And one of my favorite passages from Egil’s Saga:

Thorolf and Egil were treated to good entertainment by Thorir, but in the spring they started getting a big longship ready. Once it was manned they went plundering that summer in the Baltic, won a great deal of loot and fought a good number of battles. They sailed all the way to Courland and lay there at anchor for two weeks of peaceful trading. Then they started plundering again and made attacks on several places.

The passage tells us something about the evolution of attitudes toward possession and property (meum and tuum, but especially tuum, “thine”). If it was not locked or defended, the Vikings would steal it. If it was well defended, they would trade for it. In the long run, trade has proven better for all.

P.S Another of Egil’s battle poems:

West over water I wallowed in the slain-stack,
Angry, my Adder struck
Adils in the battle-storm.
Olaf played the steel-game,
The English his enemies;
Hriing sought the raging blades,
No ravens went hungry.