Atlas, Not Shrugging
The Washington Times reports on a recent series of grants and prizes awarded to free-market think tanks and activist and research groups pushing free-market ideas around the globe The money comes from the:
Atlas Economic Research Foundation, founded in 1981 to promote the work of fledgling global think tanks supporting private-property rights, limited government, the rule of law, and market economics.
Winners of the four major Templeton Freedom Prizes for Excellence in Promoting Liberty—for market-oriented poverty programs; for ethics and values; for social entrepreneurship; and for student outreach—received $10,000 awards, and second-place winners in each category received $5,000.
Among those honored this year: a pro-market think tank in Lithuania; an Ontario, Canada, institute promoting school-choice programs; a Mexican think tank that studies the economic costs of corruption; and a private research group in China that tracks deregulatory reforms adopted by the country's provincial governments.
Alejandro A. Chafuen, president and chief executive officer at Atlas, noted that "more people have been lifted out of poverty in the last two decades in China and India than at any time in human history."
"And it was the free market—not any government program—that was directly responsible," he said.
Atlas works with about 300 think tanks in 67 countries, providing financial and administrative support to many of the research groups in their struggling early years.