Essays & News

  The French unemployment rate has not fallen below 7 percent since the 1970s. In the second quarter of 2026, it stood at 8.3 percent as the economy contended with low labor productivity growth, an aging population and a low workforce participation rate. Many young professionals, including engineers, are leaving the country for jobs abroad, […]

  This speech was delivered in a slightly abridged form on 21 September 2026 in Zurich at the launch of the new book Wer ist der grössere Versager: Markt oder Staat?, co-authored by Štěpán Drábek and Olivier Kessler and published by the Swiss think tank Liberales Institut. The book is available, among other places, from […]

  The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer once said: “The highest form of recognition in Germany is envy.” I have always tended to disagree with this. Over the past 80 years, Germany has been an extraordinarily successful country, rebuilding itself from the ashes of World War II and developing one of the world’s most efficient economies. […]

  “Der Zustand des Wettbewerbes ist dadurch gekennzeichnet, dass der einzelneKäufer oder Verkäufer den Marktpreis nicht merklich beeinflussen kann, sondernmitdem PreisalsmiteinergegebenenGrösserechnen muss. Wolltesich der einzelneVerkaufswerbervomMarktefernhalten, um einePreissteigerungherbeizuführen, so würde er sich hierdurch vom Tausch ausschliessen.” Franz Xaver Weiss   Franz Xaver Weiss’ list of publications is distinctly shorter and his international repute much less when […]

As part of ECAEF’s “Publish with Us” project, we are pleased to feature contributions from a new generation of authors. This article was written by Ricardo Sampaio from Students For Liberty. An agrarian reform applauded as a victory for distributism was, in fact, the ingenious mechanism that financed the spectacular leap to industrial capitalism. When […]