EJW Audio

Benoît Malbranque discusses an early statement of the laissez-faire principle that emphasized the impossibility of the state gathering sufficient knowledge to improve the outcome of free trade enterprise. He links it to earlier and later intellectual developments in liberal economic thought.  His EJW contribution  discussed in this podcast appeared in the September 2021 issue.

Jens Grandell discusses the rise of liberal ideas in Finland over the 19th century, and the role of language—Finnish versus Swedish—in making an independent country of Finland to stand against Russian hegemony. The conversation is based on  Grandell’s article in EJW .

Austin Sandler finds that an ill-founded rule is being mechanically applied in anthropometry to discard datasets, and he argues that it harms science and society.  His EJW article  discussed in this podcast appeared in the March 2021 issue.

Enrique Guerra-Pujol discusses the primary source evidence about Adam Smith’s love life, what to make of it, and why we care. The conversation is based on  his EJW article “Adam Smith in Love.”

Lucas Berlanza discusses the rich history of Brazil, its “patrimonial” politics, and its veins of liberalism, based on  his EJW article “Liberalism in Brazil.”

Building on  his EJW article , Scott Drylie reads Adam Smith on schooling and government, and the secondary literature. He challenges the orthodox view, which paints Smith as plainly favorable to government involvement in schooling.

Karen Horn and Stefan Kolev led a group effort to produce  the first-ever English translation of Carl Menger’s The Errors of Historicism in German Economics . Here, Horn and Kolev describe Menger’s conflict with Gustav Schmoller, leader of the Younger German Historical School—a conflict known as the Methodenstreit.

Arnold Kling is interviewed by econometrician Brendan Beare about  his EJW article  on the sage who took the con out of econometrics.

Evan Osborne discusses Joan Robinson’s communism and how it has been treated by scholars, based on his EJW article  “Captive of One’s Own Theory: Joan Robinson and Maoist China.”

Nicholas Curott discusses six leading undergraduate textbooks in money and banking, based on  the thorough EJW article  coauthored with Tyler Watts and Benjamin Thrasher. The authors find quite consistent government-cheerleading bias.

Young Back Choi provides a crash course in Korean political history and the role of liberalism, up to the present, based on  his EJW article coauthored with Yong Yoon .

Martin van Staden, of the Free Market Foundation in Johannesburg, discusses  his article on classical liberalism in South Africa during the period 1910–2019 . He is interviewed by the Cato Institute’s Marian Tupy, a South African expat.

Ron Michener explains his belief that cliometricians are getting colonial money wrong, and in ways that prevent a proper understanding of the why the American colonies rebelled against England. The discussion is based on  his EJW article  that focuses on Farley Grubb’s article in the Journal of Economic History.

Patrick Mardini discusses the history of Lebanon and struggles for freer enterprise there, based on  his article  for the EJW  series  on Classical Liberalism in Econ, by Country. Dr. Mardini is now President of the  Lebanese Institute for Market Studies .

UCLA finance professor Ivo Welch discusses the prestigious journal that he founded and edits,  Critical Finance Review , a journal of critical commentary in the scholarly field of finance.

James Forder explains one of the reasons Milton Friedman received the Nobel prize: his early insight on the complexities of stabilization policy. The interview is based on  Forder’s article coauthored with Hugo Monnery .

Leo Krasnozhon discusses the history and current status of liberal currents in Ukraine, based on  his EJW article with Mykola Bunyk .

John W. Cairns  of the University of Edinburgh discusses  the remarkable pamphlet  that in 1758 roasted barbers’ claim to an exclusive privilege to cut hair.

New light has been shed on Friedrich Hayek’s divorce and second marriage, his move to the United States, and his position at the University of Chicago. Lanny Ebenstein explains these matters and their interrelations, based on  his EJW article .

Dwight Lee discusses the ancestral band, Hayek’s two-worlds hypothesis, and teaching economics, based on his EJW article co-authored with J. R. Clark  “Econ 101 Morality: The Amiable, the Mundane, and the Market.”

Patricia Saenz-Armstrong describes “the other path” in Peru—the liberal path—following on  her contribution  to the Classical Liberalism in Econ, by Country  series . She is interviewed by fellow Peru native and George Mason University professor Cesar Martinelli.

Daniel Sutter discusses propagandistic research by DOE, regarding (1) how mindful Americans are about household energy efficiency and (2) justifications for mandating renewable fuels in electricity production, as treated in  his EJW article .

George DeMartino discusses the emergent field of professional economic ethics—its topics, themes, and numerous nudges for practitioners—as explored in The Oxford Handbook of Professional Economic Ethics (2016), edited by him and Deirdre McCloskey. The conversation relates to  their reply  to a review essay of the Handbook.

Erik Gustaf Geijer (1783–1847) is rediscovered with the new book Freedom in Sweden: Selected Works of Erik Gustaf Geijer  (2017). The editor Björn Hasselgren here discusses Geijer’s life and works, including the wonderful  “An Economic Dream,” reprinted in EJW .

Drawing on  his paper coauthored with Xingyuan Feng and Weisen Li , Evan Osborne discusses the history and current trends of liberal thought and policy reform in China.