This week, we received news of the unfortunate loss of Sir Roger Scruton, who passed away from cancer at age 75. As Rev. Ben Johnson wrote, Scruton was a “noted philosopher, expert on aesthetics, and intellectual architect of modern conservatism,” recently described by Prime Minister Boris Johnson as “the greatest modern conservative thinker.” Scruton is perhaps best known for his contributions on munity, conservatism, and conservation, but he also had plenty to say about economic life and the marketplace. As...

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump and Chinese Vice-Premier Liu He signed “Phase One” of a two-part trade agreement between the United States and China. Here are the facts you need to know. What does the new trade deal mean for both countries? The agreement cools, or at least pauses, the 18-month-long trade war between the two nations. The world’s two largest mit to opening their markets: The U.S. reduces tariffs, while China agrees to purchase a specific amount of goods...

A senior official in the UK’s single-payer healthcare system says that patients should stop selfishly putting their own health and well-being first in order to improve the funding and “morale” of the NHS. Jessica Arnold, who “has held a number of senior roles in the NHS,” argues in the Guardian that the National Health Service would be in fine shape if citizens were willing to suffer in silence until the service can tend to them. Arnold makes an impassioned plea...

Oren Cass,author ofThe Once and Future Worker: A Vision for the Renewal of Work in America, has written a deeply confused response to Samuel Gregg’s essay ‘How Economic Nationalism Hurts Nations.’ Cass’s essay, “Comparative Disadvantage,” goes off the rails almost immediately after parative advantage: Comparative advantage allows trading partners, whether individuals or nations, to specialize where each has the lower opportunity cost, increasing total output and, through mutually beneficial exchange, leaving both with more to consume. The sooner that each...

In 2019, the mighty German economy, the economic powerhouse of the European Union, grew a mere 0.6 percent. That’s right. It grew just over half a percent. In 2018, Germany grew 1.5 percent. This is not a lot, but it was better than 2019. The German economy is Europe’s largest. Hence, when it goes wrong, things go wrong elsewhere in the EU. As reported in the Wall Street Journal: Germany’s weakness is bad news for Europe, and not just because...

We’ve just put online the Fall 2020 issue of Religion & Liberty, which looks at environmental stewardship and current problems in conservation from a number of aspects (get over to Acton’s Facebook page ment on the articles). In the cover story, I wrote about the demands for a “citizen’s assembly” to accelerate the agenda of the radical environmental organization Extinction Rebellion. Presumably, these new assemblies won’t involve elected bodies like the U.S. Congress or the Parliament of the United Kingdom:...

On December 10, 2019, shoppers in a Kosher market in Jersey City, N.J., became the targets of anti-Semitic violence. A man and a women opened fire in the grocery store, killing four people. Just a few weeks later, a man wielding a machete broke into a rabbi’s home in Monsey, New York, and stabbed five people who were in the midst of celebrating Hanukkah. One victim, 72-year-old Josef Neumann, was the most seriously injured and currently remains in a. These...

Americans celebrate the third Monday of every January in honor of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. However, his message of human dignity and racial equality inspired people worldwide, whether he delivered his sermons in Atlanta or Oslo. Below are six quotations that reflect his deepest beliefs and philosophy: On the source of human dignity: Deeply etched in the fiber of our religious tradition is the conviction that men are made in the image of God and that they are souls...

The Marxist atheist culture, in particular, aimed to root out beauty, precisely because beauty was a spiritual force for contemplating the divine and for inspiring creative thinking beyond the mindless and mand-and-control mentality. Read More… The late Sir Roger Scruton, the eminent philosopher of aesthetics, politics, liberty, and culture, returned home to his Creator last Sunday. Scruton was famous, among other things, for running an underground university for Czechoslovakian dissidents during their munist regime while teaching them Western philosophy, history...

Sir Roger Scruton, whom Acton Institute co-founder Rev. Robert Sirico once described as “perhaps the world’s leading conservative philosopher,” passed away from cancer Sunday at the age of 75. His profound intelligence probed every subject from aesthetics and sexuality to religion and the minutiae of governing. Below are 10 quotations that encapsulate his view of conservatism, culture, and the meaning of life. What is culture? A civilization is a social entity that manifests religious, political, legal, and customary uniformity over...