Acton Institute Powerblog

Promoting free societies characterized by liberty & religious principles

Rutger Bregman’s Vision: Moral Ambition Without Imagination

We’ve all read about ideologues who had a centralized plan to save the world. Well add one more to the list. Trending right now is a man named Rutger Bregman. He is passionate, eloquent, and articulate—and he seeks to rapidly transform our country (and, indeed, the entire world) into a socialist utopia. Continue Reading...

An Economist’s Summer Reading List

It’s that time of year again! Longer, warmer days hopefully bring a little more downtime for summer reading. Whether you’re reading them in a hammock or at poolside, these books are exciting and relevant and will keep your mind engaged during the dog days of summer. Continue Reading...

Economics According to St. Matthew

Michael Pakaluk, a Harvard-trained philosopher and professor of political economy at the Catholic University’s Busch School of Business, has written a new book, Be Good Bankers: The Economic Interpretation of Matthew’s Gospel with a Fresh Translation. Continue Reading...

The Tattered History of Tariffs

Much like bell-bottom jeans, tariffs are making a comeback. President Trump imposed tariffs on about $380 billion in products in his first term. The Biden administration kept most of those tariffs, then expanded them for China-made goods, including computer chips, steel, and aluminum—and quadrupled tariffs, from 25% to 100%, on electric vehicles(EVs). Continue Reading...

Fusionism and the Problem of Order

Fusionism—the union of libertarian political economy and traditional Judeo-Christian morality and spirituality—has been dubbed “the dead consensus” for some time. The consensus persists among American conservative intellectuals, but few have the energy to defend it against recent attacks. Continue Reading...

The Life and Death of Alexei Navalny

On February 16, 2024, Alexei Navalny died under mysterious circumstances in the remote Siberian penal colony to which he was moved in late 2023. Founder and leader of the Anti- Corruption Foundation, Navalny was a long-time dissident and one of the most vocal critics of Putin’s regime over the past two decades, so his suspicious death was no surprise to anyone remotely acquainted with contemporary Russian politics. Continue Reading...