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Acton Institute ranks as a global think tank leader in 2020 report

The Acton Institute is not only one of the world’s most influential thought leaders, according to a new report, but our annual Acton University ranks as the best conference presented by any think tank in the world that consistently supports a free economy. The University of Pennsylvania released its “2020 Global Go To Think Tank Index Report” on Thursday. Once again, Acton ranked well in the categories with which it has e most closely identified. This year, the report feted...

Empirical maverick: ‘Thomas Sowell: Common Sense in a Senseless World’ (watch)

“You’re about to meet one of the greatest minds of the past half-century,” says Jason Riley as he introduces his new documentary about economist Thomas Sowell. For once, a host’s description of his subject does not disappoint. The love of Riley, the author of the Wall Street Journal’s “Upward Mobility” column, for Sowell’s ideas shapes every aspect of Thomas Sowell: Common Sense in a Senseless World. The 57-minute documentary, which is drawn largely from Riley’s ing book, Maverick: A Biography...

Economic policy should focus on economic issues

With any new presidential es new policies. That’s part of the electoral calculus made by the American people every four years. Different presidents have different priorities. No one expects otherwise. That said, it’s reasonable to anticipate certain consistencies. National security policy focuses on protecting America from foreign threats; its first priority is not gender equality. Similarly the Department of Energy’s main goal is to ensure that America has sufficient energy supplies; it’s not responsible for developing educational curricula. In other...

Inequality obscures the problem of poverty

We are routinely told that rising inequality is a profoundly pernicious problem – a clear and obvious sign that the rich and well-connected continue to benefit at the expense of the poor. Whether argued by economists like Thomas Piketty and Joseph Stiglitz or politicians like Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders, the implication is clear: The government needs to play a more active and interventionist role in the distribution of wealth. But what if the reality is a bit plex, and...

What to expect in Joe Biden’s first 100 days

Ever since Franklin D. Roosevelt took office on March 4, 1933, a president’s first 100 days have served as a benchmark for his presidency. Newly inaugurated President Joe Biden has already made history by signing an unprecedented number of executive orders on his first day and pledging a flurry of legislation which will greatly expand the size, scope, and cost of government while reversing protections for people of faith and the unborn. Biden’s staff designed some of his initiatives to...

Joe Biden’s taxpayer-funded abortion order is government at its worst

Today with one stroke of the pen, President Joe Biden vitiated three unalienable rights. Biden signed a presidential memorandum order forcing U.S. taxpayers, including those with religious objections, to fund abortion-on-demand and abortion advocacy around the world. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan enacted the Mexico City Policy, which excluded foreign non-governmental agencies that “perform or actively promote abortion as a method of family planning” from receiving U.S. Agency for International Development funds. President Donald Trump’s Protecting Life in Global Health...

Paying all employees the same salary caused therapists trauma

A psychotherapy practice’s year-long experiment with paying every employee an equal salary has disproved the central economic thesis of socialism. Calvin Benton co-founded Spill, a British firm that offers psychological counseling via online technology like Zoom. He met another of pany’s founders a decade earlier while taking an economics class together. It’s not known whether the failure of pensation model came in spite of, or because of, their economics instructors. As Benton and his four co-workers got Spill off the...

RELIGION & LIBERTY

25 centuries of Christian history

Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World. Tom Holland | Basic Books | 2019 |624 pages Reading Tom Holland’s new book, Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World, one is tempted to exclaim, “The grand narrative is dead. Long live the grand narrative!” Dominion charts the history of Christianity, spanning 2,500 years of the faith’s engagement with humanity. It is designed to show how our most basic presuppositions have been shaped by the teachings of Christ and...

Dec 17, 2025

Democratic socialism: Back to the feudal future?

The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class Joel Kotkin | Encounter Books | 2020 | 224 pages Reviewed by John Couretas California has long been regarded as a cultural bellwether, a place where America’s future gets its trial run. Look to California, the thinking goes, and you will see where the country is headed just a few years hence. After all, how can you argue with the genius of a place, a people, who gave...

Dec 17, 2025

Black Lives Matter: the proposition, the organization, and the movement

We must assess three issues surrounding the Black Lives Movement (BLM) if we are to understand and respond to it. These are the proposition, the organization, and the movement itself. One must strain to find anything objectionable with the proposition that “black lives matter.” It ought to be obvious that the lives of blacks matter, because blacks are human beings made in the image and likeness of God. They matter because they are human, just as the members of...

Dec 17, 2025

The deceit of ‘democratic socialism’

There is often as much concealed as revealed in our language. Context and framing are key. The serpent, the subtlest of wild creatures, knew this well when he tempted Eve by asking, “Did God say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden’?” (Genesis 3:1). Careful readers note that he was misquoting God. But the trap was baited. So too with socialism’s modern apologists, who recently added the modifier “democratic” – as though to disassociate the contemporary...

Dec 17, 2025

Anchoring ourselves during impossible times

A crisis is not a time to develop one’s philosophy. Crises catch us off guard, and if we don’t have a firmly grounded worldview prior to their arrival, we will find ourselves desperately grasping for one. As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to sweep the globe, many are trying to make sense of this new world in which we find ourselves. We live in the midst of a real crisis, which has sent people grasping for values that can make...

Dec 17, 2025

My life under democratic socialism

Democratic socialism has had a global resurgence. As many as 70% of millennials say they are “likely” to vote for a socialist candidate. The problem is that the youth of today – and for that matter Bernie Sanders – do not know what democratic socialism looks like. I do know. I lived it. And it was not pleasant. Back in 1979, the state owned the energy, steel,coal mining, shipbuilding, automobile, and virtually everyotherimportant industry you can imagine. My first...

Dec 17, 2025

In praise of suburban sprawl

City on a Hill: Urban Idealism in America from the Puritans to the Present Alex Krieger | Belknap Press | 2019 | 464 pages In the catalog of things that are getting a hard rethink in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, we must include the disparagement of suburban sprawl and the virtues of urban densification. Yes, much of this critique can be dismissed as elite snobbery. But now it is looking increasingly like sprawl is very good indeed,...

Dec 17, 2025

Robert Smalls

Robert Smalls (1839-1915) is remembered, if at all, for his daring escape from slavery and sometimes for his subsequent election to Congress. But he should be remembered as a champion of entrepreneurship, economic opportunity, and equality for all people. Robert Smalls was born a slave on John McKee’s plantation in Beaufort, South Carolina, on April 5, 1839. His mother, Lydia Polite, was a house slave and his father was likely John’s son. When Smalls turned 12, owner Henry McKee...

Dec 17, 2025

Editor's Note: Summer 2020

We long intended to dedicate an issue of Religion & Liberty to democratic socialism. At that time, Bernie Sanders led the Democratic primaries, Elizabeth Warren attempted to outbid him, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had been hailed as the future of her party and the Roman Catholic Church. In the intervening months, however, the locus of the U.S. socialist movement has shifted from organized political campaigns to diffuse, mass movements. Our cover story documents, in a straightforward way, the public platform...

Dec 17, 2025

The economic and moral case against hoarding

We live in strange and unprecedented times. The exponential spread of COVID-19 has created chaos, fear, and panic. One of the scariest aspects of living through this pandemic, besides the health and safety of our families, is our uncertainty about the future. Each of us asked the same questions: How long will it be until we are safe? How long until we can browse through stores, have play dates, attend church, and hug an old friend? Uncertainty leads to...

Dec 17, 2025