Independent Review articles from March 2006

Independent Review archives from March 2006

Limited government: ave atque vale.
March 22, 2006... For those who prize liberty, May and June 2005 were dark months. In that brief span, three pillars of liberty were destroyed, perhaps forever. (1) The U.S. Congress in May mandated a uniform national identification card for virtually all...

Treating doctors as drug dealers: the drug enforcement administration's war on prescription painkillers.
March 22, 2006... Untreated pain is a serious problem in the United States. Given the difficulties in measuring a condition that is untreated, estimates of the number of people affected vary, but most experts agree that tens of millions of Americans suffer from...

Entrepreneurship.
March 22, 2006... The theory of entrepreneurship is one of the weakest links in modern economics. Despite an extensive and diverse literature (see Hebert and Link 1988; Casson 2003), entrepreneurship remains "the phenomenon which is most emphasized yet least...

Why have kiwis not become tigers? Reforms, entrepreneurship, and economic performance in New Zealand.
March 22, 2006... The New Zealand economy is now famous in policy circles for its turnaround during the 1980s and 1990s. Starting from a state of semiautarky in the early 1980s, New Zealand now has one of the most vibrant economies in the world. In fifteen...

Does nation building work?(REFLECTIONS)
March 22, 2006... In plunging into war, hope generally triumphs over experience. The past--the quiet statistical tabulation of what happened when such plunges were taken before--tends to be ignored in the heat of angry oratory and the thump of military boots. At...

Business and the Welfare State in France and Germany.(The Politics of Social Risk: Business and Welfare State Development)(Book review)
March 22, 2006... In The Politics of Social Risk: Business and Welfare State Development (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003), Isabella Mares seeks to demonstrate that the business community is not necessarily against the development of the welfare...

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed.(Book review)
March 22, 2006... Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed By Jared Diamond New York: Viking, 2005. Pp. 592. $29.95 cloth, $17.00 paperback. A fascinating book lies within the nearly six hundred pages of Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies...

Black Titan: A. G. Gaston and the Making of a Black Millionaire.(Book review)
March 22, 2006... Black Titan: A. G. Gaston and the Making of a Black Millionaire By Carol Jenkins and Elizabeth Gardner Hines New York: One World/Ballantine Books, 2003. Pp. 336. $24.95 cloth, $14.95 paperback. By the 1960s, Arthur G. Gaston was...

The Political Economy of Stalinism: Evidence from the Soviet Secret Archives.(Book review)
March 22, 2006... The Political Economy of Stalinism By Paul Gregory New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Pp. x1, 308. $90.00 cloth, $32.95 paperback. Paul Gregory has long been a leading figure in the field of comparative economic systems and in the...

Towards a Liberal Utopia?(Book review)
March 22, 2006... Towards a Liberal Utopia? Edited by Philip Booth London: Institute of Economic Affairs, 2005. Pp. 300. 15.00 [pounds sterling] paperback. Towards a Liberal Utopia? may be described as a set of variations on a theme stated by F. A. Hayek in...