mon clichés about “kid socialists” are now well-embedded in the American imagination. The path is well-worn: young person attends college, reads Karl Marx in Sociology 101, buys Che Guevara t-shirt, attends progressive protests, supports socialistic candidates, and, eventually, grows up. That’s a bit of an oversimplification, of course. But it’s also a bit of a thing. Why? What is it about our youth that makes socialism so attractive, and what is it about age or life experience that makes it...

Today’s demolition of the already half-collapsed Morandi Bridge is the definitive end of an economic revival that began over 50 years ago in the mega Italian port city of Genoa. The economic boom lasted well into the early 2000s thanks to what was then considered a perfect marriage of civil engineering and rapidly merce. Genoa (named from the Latin janua for “door” ) was since ancient Roman times considered one of the principle gates through which merce would be pass...

The Acton Institute has posted a new translation as part of its ongoing outreach to the French-speaking world. The article, “La montée munisme dans des habits catholiques,” describes efforts to use Catholic rhetoric to promote the same statist aims once advanced by the former Communist Party in Eastern Europe. The article notes how history proves the encroaching power of the state, advanced under the guise of promoting Catholicism, can as easily be used to drive people of faith to society’s...

Lord Acton famously wrote that “liberty is the delicate fruit of a mature civilization.” Liberty, Acton argued was rare and required constant attention to be maintained. As many have noted, one of the challenges with political liberty is that it creates the conditions for its own demise from within. Whether es from decadence and abuse of liberty to revolutionaries within liberal society, or more likely bination of both. One would not normally associate the writings of Carl Jung with those...

Willmoore Kendall defied the norms of many mainstream intellectual movements. Those who knew him recall a “typical strangeness” that characterized the man and his works. He was a solitary figure who has been largely forgotten in today’s conservative conversations. But, nonetheless, Kendall’s radically original ideas need to be rediscovered just as he was a “rediscoverer of the historic American political orthodoxy.” And what better time to engage his work than this, the fifty-second anniversary of his death. Willmoore Kendall Jr....

The newest issue of the Journal of Markets & Morality has been published both in print and online here. Scholarly contributions range from a study of joy and labor in Ecclesiastes, virtue and vice in the American founding, whistleblowing, and the economics and ethics of education, including a Controversy debating the merits and demerits of the tenure system. The first two entries of this four-part feature, authored by James E. Bruce and Aeon J. Skoble, respectively, can be read open-access...

AsReligious Freedom es to a close, a survey captures a striking result: Fewer Americans mitted to the right of religious liberty, yet Protestant pastors are less concerned about the issue than they have been in years. The es in a recentpollfrom Barna Research. The good news is that 55 percent of Americans strongly agree with the statement: “True religious freedom means that all citizens must have freedom of conscience, which means being able to believe and practice the mitments and...

Acton University, with alumni from over 100 countries worldwide, inspires many to defend liberty and promote virtue throughout the world. Garreth Bloor, a leader in the Acton Institute network and AU alumnus, serves as an inspiration as he has dedicated much of his life to defending freedom globally. Bloor first attended Acton University in 2006 when he was living in South Africa studying at the University of Cape Town, but his fight to defend liberty started at a much younger...

Last night was the second primary presidential debate of the election season. The debates are promoted as a way to distinguish the candidates from one another. But they are a terrible format for achieving that objective (see: Why presidential primary debates make us dumber). Currently, there are 24 Democrats who have officially declared they are running for their party’s nomination. On the other side of the political spectrum only one Republican—former Massachusetts governor William F. Weld—is challenging President Trump. Can...

Acton TGS At the center of the economy are human persons. Economics must first be a human discipline before it can be a technical one.One of the essential characteristics of the human person is that we are social beings. While each of us is a subject and a unique and unrepeatable person, we achieve human flourishing and moral perfection in relationship with others. We cannot do this alone. We are neither radical individuals, nor are we indistinct parts of a...