Last week I had the great pleasure of attending the Association of Private Enterprise Education (APEE) annual conference. I saw many excellent presentations, including Ed Stringham’s talk on anarchism, Abigail Hall presenting a paper on how foreign wars bring repression home, David Skarbek discussing prison gangs as self-governing institutions that facilitate market exchange, Brian Meehan…

Os Estados Unidos têm uma história inconsistente com o ambientalismo. Os americanos sempre tiveram orgulho de sua herança natural. O movimento de conservação dos anos 1890, liderado por John Muir e outros, deu origem a instituições cívicas, públicas e privadas dedicadas à proteção da natureza. A revolução industrial, porém, em conjunto com o advento do…

Following the military defeat of the Southern Jeffersonians in the Civil War and the war reparations placed upon their property and livelihood, the American political world was left to the Hamiltonians for a generation. There were few options left. Jeffersonians in the North were tagged as Copperheads and rebel sympathizers. Southern Jeffersonians were disenfranchised in…

The United States has a varied history with environmentalism. Americans have always taken pride in their natural heritage. The conservation movement of the 1890s, championed by the likes of John Muir, gave rise to civic, public and private sector institutions dedicated to conservation. The industrial revolution, however, coupled with the rise of modern capitalism, the…

Ahmad Barqawi discusses why the Arab League should be dissolved. Binoy Kampmark discusses the military dictatorship in Egypt. Roberta A. Modugno discusses the Levellers. Lucy Steigerwald discusses how the War on Drugs is literal. James Bovard discusses USDA’s regulation of raisin production and distribution. Ryan McMaken discusses Ron Paul, Richard Cobden, and the risky nature…

C4SS Media presents Sheldon Richman‘s “In Praise of “Thick” Libertarianism” read by James Tuttle and edited by Nick Ford. The freedom philosophy is intimately related to ethical, political, and methodological individualism. Therefore, the philosophy should be expected to detest any kind of collectivism — and particularly its “lowest, most crudely primitive form” — even in its nonviolent manifestations….

If I were compelled to summarize the libertarian philosophy’s distinguishing feature while standing on one foot, I’d say the following: Every person owes it to all other persons not to aggress them. This is known as the nonaggression principle, or NAP. What is the nature of this obligation? The first thing to notice is that…

In one of my blog posts; I discussed property rights and the Civil Rights era sit-ins. This post is a further exploration of the subject. I said the following in the previous post: These bills make an Orwellian use of terms like freedom. The ability to exclude people for irrational and arbitrary reasons is not…

In America il 15 aprile, giorno della dichiarazione dei redditi, è una celebrazione. In questo giorno noi cittadini siamo orgogliosi di stare assieme in una società democratica e di prendere le decisioni cooperando tra noi. I frutti del nostro sudore, sotto l’occhio vigile della IRS (il fisco americano, ndt), sono distribuiti tra la società, edificano…

It’s been five months since we at C4SS launched the Entrepreneurial Anti-Capitalism project in a bid to provide some much needed support to people engaged in the construction of a new world. We sought projects that either lay the ground for, or skillfully employ, tools and techniques to uproot, undermine or obviate centralized and authoritarian…

Ivan Eland discusses U.S. security agencies. Uri Avnery discusses changing the Israeli flag. Eric Sommer discusses why journalists have blood on their hands. Patrick Cockburn discusses Saudi Arabia’s regret over supporting terrorism. Robin Philpot discusses Rwanda. Matt Peppe discusses terrorism directed against Cuba. Jacob G. Hornberger discusses treating people like garbage. Sheldon Richman discusses the…

April 15 seems to be a holiday of sorts for progressives, who inevitably trot out Oliver Wendell Holmes’s quote about taxes being “the price we pay for civilization,” and reminding us of all the great stuff — roads, schools, etc. — that they pay for. But on closer examination, tax day really isn’t a very…

Last week, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers announced an astonishing breakthrough in an ongoing campaign to win wage increases for 80,000 -100,000 seasonal laborers picking tomatoes for Florida farms. Even more surprising, C.I.W. announced that the concessions came from Walmart, in a negotiated, government-free agreement with one of the more die-hard enemies of union contracts in corporate America. Reported…

Tax day, April 15th, is a day of celebration in the United States. On this day we citizens of the great republic take pride in the fact that we can come together in a democratic society and make decisions cooperatively with one another. The fruits of our labor, beholden to the IRS, will now be…

C4SS Media presents Joel Schlosberg‘s “The Forever of Anti-Capitalism” read by James Tuttle and edited by Nick Ford. Some radicals not usually thought of as economists foresaw the essential principle. Howard Zinn envisaged a time when “[c]ertain basic things would be abundant enough to be taken out of the money system and be available — free — to everyone.” Even…

The entrepreneur is given considerable accolades in today’s political discourse. Republicans laud them as role models, paragons of the protestant work ethic. Democrats celebrate the jobs they add to the economy. Libertarians of all stripes love them for their independence and key role in markets. It seems that only advocates of the various forms of…

Nel 2010 Newt Gingrich spiegò che il presidente americano Barack Obama “non si capisce” se non si tiene conto del suo orientamento “anticoloniale keniano” come punto di riferimento interpretativo del suo comportamento bizzarro. Certo che Obama è riuscito a nascondere benissimo il suo odio profondo verso il colonialismo; tanto che ha elogiato l’Europa, in un…

C4SS Media presents David S. D’Amato‘s “The New Economy and the Cost Principle” read by James Tuttle and edited by Nick Ford. “As free marketers, decentralists and individualists, we occupy a corner of the libertarian movement. At the same time, as critics of wealth inequality and champions of the poor and working classes, we find ourselves within today’s…

C4SS Media presents Christiaan Elderhorst‘s “Bitcoin Must Self-Regulate — The State Can Only Destroy” read by James Tuttle and edited by Nick Ford. “Currently there is no system by which Bitcoin marketplaces can be held accountable. Resorting to government legal systems might indeed be the only way by which Mt.Gox customers can receive the restitution they deserve. What…

I continue to have trouble believing that the libertarian philosophy is concerned only with the proper and improper uses of force. According to this view, the philosophy sets out a prohibition on the initiation of force and otherwise has nothing to say about anything else. (Fraud is conceived as an indirect form of force because, say, a deceptive seller…