Mont Pelerin Society

The Mont Pelerin Society (MPS) is an international organisation, consisting of libertarian economists and business leaders, which advocates the "economic society". It has close ties to the network of think tanks sponsored in part by the Atlas Economic Research Foundation.

"Economic society" is the doctrine that the free market is the ultimate expression of humanity and should therefore be given sufficient primacy to define our society. This parallels Adam Smith's faith in the "invisible hand".

Influence

MPS founder F. A. Hayek stressed that the society was to be a scholarly community arguing ideas against collectivism while not engaging in public relations or propaganda. However, the society has always been a focal point for the international free market think-tank movement: Hayek himself used it as a forum to encourage members such as Antony Fisher to pursue the think-tank route in favour of politics. Fisher went on the establish the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) in London during 1971, the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. during 1973, and the Atlas Economic Research Foundation in 1981. In turn the Atlas Foundation supports a wide network of think-tanks, including the Fraser Institute and the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. All these organisations continue to share close ties with the MPS.

Prominent MPS members who have advanced to policy positions include Chancellor Ludwig Erhard of West Germany, President Luigi Einaudi of Italy, Chairman Arthur Burns of the U.S. Federal Reserve Board, and, currently, Prime Minister Vaclav Klaus of the Czech Republic. Eight MPS members, including F. A. Hayek, Milton Friedman, and George Stigler, won Nobel prizes in economics. Of 76 economic advisers on Ronald Reagan's 1980 campaign staff, 22 were MPS members, including Anderson himself. [1]

History

In 1947, "36 scholars, mostly economists, with some historians and philosophers, were invited by Professor Friedrich Hayek to meet at Mont Pelerin, Switzerland, and discuss the state, and possible fate, of liberalism". Invitees included Henry Simons (who would later train Milton Friedman, later a president of the society, at the University of Chicago); the American Fabian socialist Walter Lippman; Viennese Aristotelian Society leader Karl Popper; fellow Austrian School economist Ludwig von Mises; Sir John Clapham, a senior official of the Bank of England who from 1940-46 was the president of the British Royal Society; Otto von Hapsburg, the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne; and Max von Thurn und Taxis, Bavaria-based head of the 400-year-old Venetian Thurn und Taxis family."[2]

"The resulting Mont Pelerin Society aimed to 'facilitate an exchange of ideas between like-minded scholars in the hope of strengthening the principles and practice of a free society and to study the workings, virtues, and defects of market-oriented economic systems.'"[3]

Meetings

Between August 14-19, 2004, Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment (FREE) will host the 2004 general meeting of the Mont Pelerin Society at the Grand America Hotel in Salt Lake City, August 14-19, 2004. [4]

Personnel

• Leonard Liggio, President
• Christian Watrin, Senior Vice President
• Carl-Johan Westholm, Secretary (Sweden)
• Edwin J. Feulner, Treasurer (USA)
• John Blundell, Vice President
• Ramon Diaz, Vice President
• Hannes Gissurarsen, Vice President
• Richard Wong, Vice President
• Charles Baird, Director
• Carlos Cáceres, Director
• Jean-Pierre Centi, Director
• Jesus Huerta de Soto, Director
• Eduardo Mayora, Director
• Ruth Richardson, Director
• Yoshinori Shimizu, Director

External links

• Mont Pelerin.
• Marc Haegeman, The general meeting files of the Mont Pèlerin Society (1947-1998). 108pp pdf.
• William H. Peterson, A History of the Mont Pelerin Society by R. M. Hartwell (book review), The Freeman, Foundation for Economic Education, July 1996.
• Spinwatch profile of The Mont Pelerin Society