The Locke Institute, Fairfax, VA
Public Goods and Private Communities: The Market Provision of Social Services by Fred Foldvary
Edward Elgar Publishing , Brookfield, VT, 1994
Do public goods and services, such as streets, parks and dams, have to be provided by the government? Public Good and Private Communities suggests that they do not.
The Locke Institute book illustrates, in theory and in practice, how private contractual arrangements are, in fact, more efficient at providing these ‘public services’ than central planners. Arguing that an entrepreneur can provide collective good by consensual community agreements, Fred Foldvary uses a series of case studies to examine how private communities, like the Reston Association in Virginia and the private neighborhoods of St. Louis, have been successful in financing their own public good and services. At a time when many of America’s cities are plagued by decay, violence and poverty, Foldvary argues that prosperity can be restored to cities if private communities are allowed to develop unhampered by government restrictions.
Roy E. Cordato, reviewing Public Good and Private Communities for The Freeman, wrote, ‘Fred Foldvary has made a valuable contribution to the economic literature on public goods and public finance. If it is fully appreciated by the economics profession it could revolutionize and dramatically improve the study of urban economics specifically and public economics in general.’
Libertad y Desarrollo, Santiago, Chile
Las Tareas de Hoy: Politicas sociales y Económicas para una Sociedad Libre (Today’s Tasks: Social and Economic Policies for a Free Society) , Cristian Larroulet, ed.
Zig-Zag Press, Santiago, Chile, 1994
With the publication of Las Tareas de Hoy, Libertad y Desarrollo continued its efforts to promote the market economy in Chile.
In the early 1990s the institute’s scholars began a multi-year study of the problems and challenges facing the country. The result was a series of thoughtful essays outlining their findings and offering comprehensive free-market solutions, focusing on macroeconomics, foreign trade, poverty, education, health, justice, infrastructure and the modernization of the state.
The book was widely disseminated among politicians, government officials, policy makers and other opinion leaders. The Minister General Secretary of the President of the Chilean Government, Genaro Arriagada, delivered one of the most notable presentations of the book at a conference held in 1994 to launch the publication.
Cato Institute, Washington, DC
Perpetuating Poverty: The World Bank, the IMF, and the Developing World , Doug Bandow and Ian Vásquez, ed.
Cato Institute, Washington, DC, 1994
In an important contribution to the debate over international aid, Perpetuating Poverty argues that the most important thing the West can do to help developing countries move toward free markets and political pluralism is to ‘get out of the way.’
At a time when multilateral aid agencies, like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, were increasing demands for more money from Western taxpayers, Perpetuating Poverty exposed the failure of such organizations. Far from being the saviors of developing nations, the policies of the World Bank and the IMF have retarded development, enlarged the state and impoverished nations around the world.
Through a critical examination of the failures of these aid agencies in developing countries around the world, the Cato book has done a great deal to improve public understanding of what is needed for development, not government-to-government aid, but property rights, markets, the rule of law and free trade. As one reviewer wrote, ‘with the best of intentions much harm is still being inflicted on the people of poor countries. In light of the persistence of the problem, those genuinely concerned should give themselves the opportunity to reexamine their premises, and this collection of essays offers them an excellent opportunity.’
The Future of Freedom Foundation, Fairfax, VA
Separating School & State by Sheldon Richman
The Future of Freedom Foundation, Fairfax, VA, 1994
While most market-oriented school reformers argue that government schools are failing, Separating School & State asserts that they are actually quite effective in carrying out their mission: to suppress individual initiative and to support the state. These institutions undermine families, promote politically correct propaganda, provoke social conflict and throttle independent thinking, Sheldon Richman persuasively argues, because that is exactly what they have been designed to do.
In tracing the startling history of government schools, the Future of Freedom Foundation book mounts a fundamental challenge to the government monopoly on education and provides an exciting vision of how much better off society would be with completely private, voluntary schools.
As John Taylor Gatto, New York State Teacher of the Year, 1991, and the author of Dumbing Us Down has written, ‘ Separating School and State makes it clear that even with the best of intentions, force and compulsion set processes in motion which mutilate family life, replace education with indoctrination and bring the myth of Procrustes to life. The solutions proposed make such good sense, the ‘official’ reform crowd should hang its head in shame.’
The controversial book garnered a wide audience and sparked discussion around the country, establishing Richman as an important voice in the education debate. It was reviewed in a wide range of publications and was the subject of Michael Prowse’s column in the Financial Times.
The Independent Institute, Oakland, CA
Beyond Politics: Markets, Welfare and the Failure of Bureaucracy by William C. Mitchell and Randy T. Simmons
Westview Press, Boulder, CO, 1994
In the years since its publication, The Independent Institute’s Beyond Politics has become a classic on economics of a free society. Using public choice theory, William Mitchell and Randy Simmons provide a systematic and authoritative analysis of the dysfunction of modern politics, why people are increasingly outraged with their governments, and what reforms are essential to restore the Jeffersonian and classical liberal vision of self-government and free markets.
Challenging the traditional public policy and welfare economics argument that ‘market failures’ are common and require the intervention of government in order to serve and protect the public good, the book demonstrates the relationship of government and markets by emphasizing the actual rather than the ideal workings of governments and by reuniting the insights of economics with those of political science. The result is a unified and powerful perspective on the market process, property rights, politics, contracts and government bureaucracy, which former Delaware governor Pete du Pont called ‘the best primer on political reality.’
Reviewers praised not only the scholarship of the book, but also the clarity of its arguments. As Richard Epstein, Professor of Law at the University of Chicago wrote, ‘In Beyond Politics, William Mitchell and Randy Simmons have written an accessible and compelling account of the major issue of our time, the intersection of politics and the market.’ This combination of strong writing and innovative thinking helped the book have an impact far beyond academia. Reviews appeared in a number of national publications and extracts were reprinted in Policy Review, Society, and The World & I.
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