Prize Winner

Johan Norberg, author of the invaluable In Defense of Global Capitalism and the subject of an interview in the December issue of reason, has been awarded a prize from the German Hayek Stiftung. He's posted a nice acceptance speech on his blog.

A snippet:

In my book In Defence of Global Capitalism, I am not in any way trying to re-invent the wheel of markets and liberalism ? the wheel that John Locke, Adam Smith and F A Hayek invented is perfectly sufficient for mankind. Instead I am trying to explain to people why this wheel is a fantastic invention, and to convince the anti-globalisation movement not to try to destroy it, and the EU-bureaucrats not to stop it with regulations and harmonisation.

Some economists think that we need not care about the anti-capitalist movement. They are confused and ignorant of economics, and since they are guided by ideology and not facts, they won?t change their minds anyway. Why waste our time confronting them?

One reason to do it is that exactly those confused views will guide public policy, if they are not challenged in public debate. Hayek did not write his reply [to John Maynard Keynes' The General Theory of Employment], so people only read Keynes? point of view. Today we have to confront those scholars, groups and movements who attack the open society and the open economy, because otherwise, the media, the politicians and the public will only hear their point of view, and act accordingly.