As Michelle Kaffenberger points out, parents in the poorest parts of India share a concern of many Americans: Their children don’t actually learn much in the public schools. A recentEconomistarticle states that between a quarter and a third of school children in India attend private schools. In India’s cities, experts estimate as many as 85 percent of children attend private schools. According toanother report, 73 percent of families in Hyderabad’s slum areas send their children to private schools. Additionally, private...

The pope turns 85 today. On the website of Crisis Magazine, Acton Research Director Samuel Gregg looks at this most prominent of “status-quo challengers.” While regularly derided by his critics as “decrepit” and “out-of-touch,” Benedict XVI continues to do what he’s done since his election as pope seven years ago: which is to shake up not just the Catholic Church but also the world it’s called upon to evangelize. His means of doing so doesn’t involve “occupying” anything. Instead, it...

Robert D. Cooter, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, explains how law can end the poverty of nations: Nick Schulz: Your book offers a framework for thinking about how it is that some nations are rich, some are poor, and others are in between. You stress the importance of changes in laws and legal structure as the catalyst for growth. Why are legal institutions so important? Robert Cooter: Ineffective law inhibits growth by forcing too much dealing...

Steven Garber, principal and founder of The Washington Institute for Faith, Vocation and Culture, believes that what kind of school our children attend is far less important than what kind of people they are shaped into: [W]here they go to school is not finally the most important decision; how they learn and who they e with what they learn is more critical. As I long argued at Rivendell—remembering the moral vision of Tolkien himself—it is not only important that our...

Victor Claar at Acton On Tap If you weren’t able to join us at Derby Station in East Grand Rapids last night for Acton On Tap, you missed a great discussion on the topic of Envy: Socialism’s Deadly Sin with Dr. Victor Claar of Henderson State University. Acton’s own Dr. Jordan Ballor opened the evening’s conversation with some theological reflections on the nature of envy, with Claar following up with his discussion of envy from an economic perspective. Again, if...

Michael Miller, a Research Fellow and Director of Media at the Acton Institute, will be participating in an economy panel discussion held on April 17th at 7pm in the Wege Ballroom of Aquinas College in Grand Rapids, Mich.The focus of the discussion will be economic freedom and the proper role of the state and the individual in creating and preserving conditions necessary for human flourishing and prosperity. As Lord Acton stated, “liberty is the delicate fruit of a mature civilization.”...

John L. Allen, Jr., at the National Catholic Reporter, took note of the address recently given by Cardinal Peter Turkson, just as Acton did. Allen’s blog post, which referenced Acton’s Samuel Gregg and his National Review Online piece, noted that the Cardinal posed some very specific and probing questions for business people who wish to integrate their spiritual life and work life: Am I creating wealth, or am I engaging in rent-seeking behavior? (That’s jargon for trying to get rich...

2017 marks the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. For the Winter 2012 Religion & Liberty issue, now available online, we interviewed Reformation scholar Herman Selderhuis. Refo500, under the direction of Selderhuis, wants to help people understand the meaning and lasting significance of the Reformation. Selderhuis and Refo500 are already playing an essential role in promoting the anniversary and Acton is honored to be a part of that endeavor as well. For myself, Reformation study was critical to my own...

All they asked was that we should continue to remember the poor, the very thing I had been eager to do all along. Galatians 2:10 NIV This video is part of an extended interview with Rev. Dr. John Dickson (Director, Centre for Public Christianity and Senior Research Fellow, Department of Ancient History, Macquarie University) for The Faith Effect, a project of World Vision Australia. (HT: Justin Taylor) Update: I should also add that a useful collection of primary texts on...

I had the privilege of giving the opening lecture last night for the “Limited Government and the Rule of Law” conference taking place here in Grand Rapids this weekend. The talk was on “Christian Origins of Limited Government,” and was followed by an excellent Q&A session. One of the questions had to do with economic consequences or effects of the Fall into sin, particularly with respect to the curse. There are of course myriad implications for economics from the curse,...