Liberty & Society

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For Undergraduates & Recent Graduates:

May 26-June 1 ● Wake Forest University, Winston–Salem, NC 

Daniel D’Amico

Economics, Loyola University
Daniel J. D'Amico’s dissertation, "The Imprisoner's Dilemma: The Political Economy of Proportionate Punishment," was awarded the Izrael M. Kirzner award for best dissertation on Austrian Economics. He is currently in the process of seeking publication for several of its constituent parts as well as continuing his ongoing research on the economics of crime and punishment. He participated in and conducted original field research with The Mercatus Center to investigate the effects of hurricane Katrina on the gulf coast region. »»

Mimi Gladstein

Dr. Mimi R. Gladstein is a professor of English and Theatre Arts at the University of Texas at El Paso. Her areas of concentration are contemporary American literature, Eighteenth Century British Literature, women's studies, theatre arts, Steinbeck, Hemingway and Ayn Rand. She is the author of Feminist Interpretations of Ayn Rand and The Ayn Rand Companion. She holds a PhD from the University of New Mexico in Contemporary American Literature. »»

John Hasnas

Business, Georgetown University
John Hasnas teaches courses in ethics and law at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business. He is currently working on a number of papers, including "The Centenary of a Mistake: One Hundred Years of Corporate Liability," "The Supreme Court and the Meaning of Life: A Legal and Philosophical Primer on the Right to Die," and "Reflections on Prince, Public Welfare Offenses, American Cyanamid, and the Wisdom of the Common Law." Previous works by Dr. Hasnas have appeared in publications such as the American University Law Review and the New York University Journal of Law & Liberty. »»

Bill Kline

Professor Kline holds a degree in Philosophy from Bowling Green State University and is currently an Assistant Professor of Liberal Studies at the University of Illinois, Springfield.  His areas of specialization include Economics, Business Ethics and Applied Ethics, and his recent publications  include “Collapsing Good and the Milieu of Innovation: An Examination of Mill’s principles of Liberty and Free Trade” in the Journal of Value Inquiry and “Business Ethics from the Internal Point of View” published in the Journal of Business Ethics. »»

Mark Pennington

Political Economy, University of London
Mark Pennington’s main research interests center on Hayekian and public choice analyses of the regulatory state, with a particular focus on environmental policy. He has published two books on the political economy of the British system of environmental regulation; Planning and the Political Market: Public Choice and the Politics of Government Failure and Liberating the Land. »»

June 16-22 ● Chapman University, Orange County, CA

Tom W. Bell

Law, Chapman University
Tom W. Bell teaches intellectual property, Internet, entertainment, and commercial law courses at Chapman University. After graduating from law school, he entered private practice in Silicon Valley and Washington, DC. He then joined the Program in Law and Technology at the University of Dayton School of Law. While on academic leave from Dayton, Tom served as Director of Telecommunications and Technology Studies at the Cato Institute. »»

George Crowley

Dr. George Crowley III is currently an Assistant Professor of Economics in the Sorrell College of Business and a member of the Manuel H. Johnson Center for Political Economy at Troy University. He received his PhD in Economics from West Virginia University. With primary interests in Public Economics, Constitutional Economics, and State and Local Public Finance, his work has appeared in the Journal of Management History, Southern Economic Journal, and Public Choice. »»

Brian Doherty

Senior Editor, Reason Magazine
Brian Doherty is a senior editor at Reason magazine and Reason.com. He wrote This is Burning Man (2004, Little, Brown; paperback BenBella, 2006), Radicals for Capitalism: A History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement (PublicAffairs, 2007), and Gun Control on Trial (Cato, 2008). From 1994 to 2003, Doherty worked as associate editor and reporter for Reason, writing a variety of stories on topics ranging from the Americans with Disabilities Act to pollution-credit trading to the independent rock scene. »»

Mark LeBar

Philosophy, Ohio University in Athens
Mark Lebar specializes in moral, social, and political philosophy. His published papers have covered ethics, political philosophy, and philosophy of mind. Dr. Lebar is currently at work exploring the foundations of political obligations and authority according to Aristotelian moral theory. »»

Alex Padilla

Dr. Alexandre Padilla teaches economics at Metropolitan State College of Denver. His primary fields of interest are Law & Economics, Organization Economics, and Applied Microeconomics. Among his publications are "Internal vs. External Explanations: A New Perspective on the History of Economic Thought" in Procesos De Mercado: Revista Europea De Economia Politica, and "Should The Government Regulate Insider Trading?"  in the Journal of Libertarian Studies. »»

Timothy Sandefur

Timothy Sandefur is a Principal Attorney at the Pacific Legal Foundation. As the lead attorney in the Foundation's Economic Liberty Project, he works to protect businesses against abusive government regulation. He holds a Juris Doctor from Chapman University and is an adjunct professor of law at the McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento. His publications include The Right to Earn A Living: Economic Freedom And The Law, Cornerstone of Liberty: Property Rights in 21st Century America, and “Does The State Create The Market?” in the Harvard Journal of Law And Public Policy. »»

July 7-13 ● Bryn Mawr College, Philadelphia, PA area

Joshua Hall

Economics, Beloit College
Josh is an assistant professor of economics at Beloit College.  He researches applied microeconomics, specifically state and local public finance and also economic education entrepreneurship and economic freedom. He primarily teaches principles of economics, intermediate micro, and public economics. Josh received his Ph.D. in economics from West Virginia University and graduate and undergraduate degrees in economics from Ohio University. He was formerly an economist for the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress.»»

David Hart

Director, Online Library of Liberty
David Hart is the director of Liberty Fund, Inc.'s online Library of Economics and Liberty. Dr. Hart began teaching in the Department of History at the University of Adelaide, South Australia in 1986, received the university teaching prize in 1992, and was tenured in 1994. Subjects taught and areas of graduate research supervised include modern European history, nineteenth-century classical liberal thought, the Enlightenment, war and culture, film and history, history and the Internet »»

James Stacey Taylor

Philosophy, The College of New Jersey
James Stacey Taylor teaches Bioethics, Ethics, Modern Philosophy, and various applied ethics and core philosophy courses. He spends a lot of time thinking and writing about autonomy—an area of philosophy that helps us understand when individuals are truly motivated by their own concerns, hopes, desires, and wills. »»

Claudia Williamson

Claudia R. Williamson is a post-doctoral fellow at the Development Research Institute of New York University. Her research focuses on applied microeconomics, the political economy of development, and the effectiveness of development policies, such as foreign aid. She completed her Ph.D. in economics at West Virginia University in May 2008 where her dissertation considered the importance of informal institutions, such as culture, for economic development. »»

For Graduate Students:

June 9-15 ● Bryn Mawr College, Philadelphia, PA area

Andrew Cohen

Acting Director of the Jean Beer Blumenfeld Center for Ethics, Georgia State University
Andrew I. Cohen’s research interests are broadly focused in ethics and political philosophy. He has recently been working on whether citizens have reasons to support liberal political institutions, the value of democratic political institutions, and the ethics of friendship. He is the acting director of the Jean Beer Blumenfeld Center for Ethics at Georgia State University.»» 

Daniel D’Amico

Economics, Loyola University
Daniel J. D'Amico’s dissertation, "The Imprisoner's Dilemma: The Political Economy of Proportionate Punishment," was awarded the Izrael M. Kirzner award for best dissertation on Austrian Economics. He is currently in the process of seeking publication for several of its constituent parts as well as continuing his ongoing research on the economics of crime and punishment. He participated in and conducted original field research with The Mercatus Center to investigate the effects of hurricane Katrina on the gulf coast region. »»

David D. Friedman

Law, Santa Clara University Law School
Professor Friedman is a Professor of Law at Santa Clara University. He specializes include economics analytis of law, computers, crime, and privacy. He has published economic analyses of affirmative action, punitive damages, trade-secret law, and accident law. Friedman has also written on the topics of price theory, medical care, population economics, the economics of war, historical perspectives on freedom, and criminal defense. »»

Ed Lopez

Ed Lopez is an Associate Professor of law & economics at San Jose State University, and a Research Fellow at The Independence Institute. Professor López's main area of research is in public choice and law and economics, with emphases on empirical models of creative expression, technological innovation, voting, political ideology, and political institutions. His scholarly articles and reviews have appeared in Public Choice, Journal of Political Science, Review of Law & Economics, Political Research Quarterly, Southern Economic Journal, Social Science Quarterly, Eastern Economic Journal, and Review of Austrian Economics. »»

Readings »