Category: Institutions

April 23, 2012. World Book and Copyright Day

Today I am joining the celebration of the World Book and Copyright Day (also known as International Day of the Book or World Book Days) a yearly event on 23 April, organized by UNESCO to promote reading, publishing and copyright. The Day was first celebrated in 1995 and in 2012 the UK World Book day was celebrated on March 1, 2012.[1]

As part of my celebration I am sharing with you some quotes from one of my favorite books.  This year I have chosen the book “The Law” written by Frederic Bastiat.  The book was first published as a pamphlet in June, 1850  and later became widely read in Europe and the world.

“Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place.” ― Frédéric Bastiat, The Law

In The Law, Bastiat states that “each of us has a natural right — from God — to defend his person, his liberty, and his property”. The State is a “substitution of a common force for individual forces” to defend this right. The law becomes perverted when it punishes one’s right to self-defense in favor of another’s acquired right to plunder.

Bastiat defines two forms of plunder: “stupid greed and false philanthropy”. Stupid greed is “protective tariffs, subsidies, guaranteed profits” and false philanthropy is “guaranteed jobs, relief and welfare schemes, public education, progressive taxation, free credit, and public works”. Monopolies and Socialism are legalized plunder which Bastiat emphasizes is legal but not legitimate.

If you are interested in reading more about this ideas here are the links to the book,

The Law (English Edition) via Amazon.com

La Ley (Spanish Edition) via Amazon.com

La Loi (annoté) (French Edition) via Amazon

Related articles

Inequality in India

By 2011 the BRIC economies had some of the highest rates of income inequality adjusted to the Human Development Index among developing nations.  At the same time, the BRIC countries had consistently had the highest GNP growth versus the previous 10 years among developing nations.  How is it that there is not a parallel growth of the Human Development of its citizens?  The answer and one of the biggest challenges for the BRIC countries is the fact that a large amount of the GNP is distributed among small elites that control their market economies.

Economists and investors such as O’Neill, Krugman and others largely emphasize the expected growth of the BRIC economies as indicators of where to invest their money.  Unfortunately, they have not paid the same interest to what many other economists consider important: the human development of the people.  Fortunately, there are still some economists who since the decade of 1970 paid a lot of attention to the issues of freedom and equality.  Economists leaded by Milton Friedman, the Economics Nobel Prize of 1976, argued that economic policies should be focused in the freedom of its citizens as a primary value.  To them, stressing equality per se could lead to economic inefficiency as well as it would put in risk Freedom itself.  However, the same economist argued that it was necessary for developing economies that the government took a central role in poverty alleviation in order to keep the pace with the economic growth of its economies.  Unfortunately, this poverty alleviation is not being done in the BRIC countries and the economic difference between the poorest and the richest continues to grow. Since the 60s, a large group of economists emphasized the negative effects of not paying attention to a free and equal development in emerging markets; economists like Friedman and Hayek wrote a lot in this regard and even recently Elinor Ostrom’s ideas, who won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2009, are still not listened by those who have forgotten the importance of good governance economic policies.

India is the country in which this income inequality versus human development is more pronounced.  Currently, India occupies the position #93 with an IHDI of 0.392 and the country has descended in the rank many positions since the last decade.  Inequality in the earnings among Indians has doubled over the last two decades, making it one of the worst performers among developing economies.  Why? This is again the result of the failed attempts by the Indian government to combat corruption, bad administration and under-payments and also of the unawareness of foreign investors.

The fact that foreign investors have no interest in securing the welfare of the Indian people is a problem.  To them, the investment opportunities of this specific BRIC country are of value until they find a better economy to move their money to.  However, the real stakeholders are not the foreign investors but the Indian Government and its groups of interest who should aim to secure the welfare of all of its citizens now that they have a chance.  While the growth of this economies will continue the effect it will have in such unequal societies will result in some of the worst rates of poverty and hunger ever seen in history. By 2025 India will be the most populous country in the world but also, it will have 268 million people (20.3%) living still with less than US$1.25 a day as reported by economists in the World Bank. The Indian government should go aligned with the current trade liberalization in order to support higher productivity in the private sector and to exploit its comparative advantage of having a labor-intensive industry to foster the production of goods and services.

Drugs: A Legal Market is not a Free Market

English: Flower of a Opium Poppy
Image via Wikipedia

A couple days ago, Otto Perez Molina, recently elected as President of Guatemala; announced that he was willing to decriminalize the commercialization of drugs. According to U.S. authorities, Guatemala has became the transshipment point for more than 75 percent of the cocaine smuggled into the United States since 2005.  Along with this, the Opium poppy cultivation is already done in large parts of the countryside making the production of Guatemalan heroin a greater and the newest worry for the United States. The country’s elites are already part of this business and the paranoia of crimes that used be a remembrance from Colombia‘s 1990s history seems to be repeating in these Central American countries.

What impresses me the most now is how this news has started spreading around my Facebook contacts (mostly libertarians and liberals). Both groups seem to be happy to hear this announcement by Guatemala’s President.  However, both groups applaud the news for different reasons.  The legalization/decriminalization of drugs will not be the panacea we all are hoping for.  Specially not if started by any of the Central American governments.  The reasons are many and I will begin by listing some of them to open the discussion,

  • Corruption, lax enforcement, and judicial impunity levels in Central America are among the highest of the world.
  • Drug lords and their new and powerful money have been mentioned by many analysts to be already part of the politic and economic elites of these countries.
  • The Central American countries in which this drugs are produced and transported are inhabited by a large majority of people living in the lowest leves of Human Development.
  • If legalized, the trade, production and commercialization of drugs (cocaine and heroine mainly) will be regulated by these governments.
  • Without any doubt, this regulations will enable and create legalized monopolies ruled with the partnership of previous drug lords and government officials.
  • It has not been advocated by any of the political leaders which road would take the legalization of drugs. This is important, because under current legalization procedures it is not the same to get the approval for a new medicine in the market as to get the approval for a new liquor, a new energizing drink or of a new edible product.

The history of the legalization (production, trade and commercialization) of items considered by many as drugs and for others as commodities has shown that for as long as a government elite hold the power to legalize it; it was in their power to take the first steps into the acquisition of a monopoly of its trade and production.

If legalized, the emergence of a coercive monopoly would be inevitable. As noted by Ayn Rand, the governments and their partners in these coercive monopolies “will be able of setting the initial prices and production policies independently of the market, with immunity from competition, from the law of supply and demand. An economy dominated by such monopolies would be rigid and stagnant.”

If we support the complete and absolute free trade of all commodities it is necessary that we do not grant to government an intrinsic right to regulate it.  No compromise should ever be done with a government that requires regulation in order to give us legalization.  Legalization should result in freedom and not in regulation.  The drug trade should be opened to businessmen and entrepreneurs in the freest way possible. The freest way is that of requiring the traders to inform their buyers about all the necessary information about the products they are offering.

We may be taking part in a historical moment in which the most important thing are principles.  Let us remember that one of the most valuable principles of trade is Freedom; and that one of the most valuable principles of government is to seek that i will Protect Individual Rights and not to regulate their lives.

Note: To understand more which are the principles that really matter in this discussion, I invite you to take a look to the video titled: The Drug War in Guatemala: A Conversation with Giancarlo Ibarguen.

Summer Seminars for You in the U.S. Apply before March 31!

Girls chatting over book

Want to find out how individual liberty and economic freedom have shaped the modern world?

Discover the classical liberal ideas that have helped to end slavery, inspire women’s suffrage, and give us religious freedom. What’s in store at an IHS Summer Seminar?

  • Plenty of discussion about today’s toughest political and social issues
  • Top-tier teaching on principles of liberty
  • Fun and purposeful interaction with peers from around the globe

Questions to warm up on:

  • What is the proper role of government?
  • How can society solve widespread problems while respecting individual liberty?
  • What are the unintended consequences of government programs?

The Right Seminar for You: Choose from 12 Options

IHS provides programs tailored to a wide variety of backgrounds. Whether you’re a seasoned libertarian or just getting curious about individual liberty, attending an IHS Summer Seminar geared toward your interests will connect you to rich resources, engaging people, and enriching ideas.

Seminar themes range from liberty fundamentals to challenging advanced topics, to career-specific material focused on public policy, academia, or journalism. Seminar topics include peace, natural rights, individual autonomy, the morality of free enterprise, the role of a free press in society, and more.

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A typical seminar day is filled with lectures, discussion groups, and time to socialize. Enjoy rewarding discussions that will lead to insights you can apply to your classes, career, and overall approach to life.

“One of the best and purest educational experiences of my life… Also, the most fun.” Anna Thorn

“I have learned more in one week than I do in some semester-long courses. This experience will help me for the rest of my career and schooling.” – Quinn Gribben

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Seminars take place on college campuses located across the United States. All participants receive a full scholarship covering housing, meals, and books. Participants are responsible for travel costs.

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Undergraduate students, graduate students, and recent graduates are eligible for most seminars (eligibility requirements vary by seminar; see specific seminar pages for details).

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Book Reco: Individual Rights and Government Wrongs by Brian Phillips

Individual Rights and Government Wrongs

An excerpt from the Introduction to Individual Rights and Government Wrongs.

This book was written for those who love the United States of America and the principles upon which it was founded.

America was founded on an ideology—the right of each individual to his own life, his own liberty, and the pursuit of his own happiness. As philosopher Leonard Peikoff writes: “America is the only country in history created not by meaningless warfare or geographic accident, but deliberately, on the basis of certain fundamental ideas.”[1] The Founding Fathers sought to establish a form of government that, unlike monarchy, theocracy, and the mob rule of democracy, recognizes and protects individual rights.

The Founders were intellectual men, widely read in the ideas of the Enlightenment. They were also practical men, concerned with the problems of life on earth. Their great achievement was transforming the ideas of the Enlightenment into a practical socio-economic system—capitalism.  Read more…

[1] Leonard Peikoff, “Assault from the Ivory Tower: The Professors’ War Against America,” in The Voice of Reason (New York: Meridian, 1989), p. 187.