Policy

Policy articles analyzing social and public policy including impacts on economics, open dialog, and social life. Articles on the topic of policy at Brownstone Institute are translated into multiple languages.

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Freedom Is Our Birthright

Freedom Is Our Birthright, Not Dependent On Medical Status

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On occasion the majority may need to swallow a risk for a time. Sometimes respecting the freedom of others will seem to cost us, but codifying human rights, and insisting on process, legalism, and law gives wisdom time to overcome fear. It is the insurance that keeps the members of a free society free.

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It’s All in Good Fun

Drs. Walensky and Offit: It’s All in Good Fun

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Did you ever think of the cruelty bordering on sadism of forcing millions of people who, thanks to natural immunity posed no infectious threat to anyone, were having to choose between taking a medication that can do them little good and might do them considerable harm, and losing their livelihood? 

Drs. Walensky and Offit: It’s All in Good Fun Read Journal Article

What Can the Stanford Prison Experiment Tell Us

What Can the Stanford Prison Experiment Tell Us about Life in the Pandemic Era?

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Given the world in which we have been living for the past two years, despite the numerous flaws critics have found in both Zimbardo’s work, it would seem that both he and other members of social psychology’s golden age can still tell us a lot about how social roles, oppressive environments and powerful authorities can alter the psyches and actions of normal people in pathological ways.

What Can the Stanford Prison Experiment Tell Us about Life in the Pandemic Era? Read Journal Article

Why Did Politicians Choose Economic Contraction Over Virus Mitigation?

Why Did Politicians Choose Economic Contraction Over Virus Mitigation?

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Poverty has always been mankind’s most brutal killer, while prosperity that’s produced the resources necessary for cures has been death’s greatest foe. Politicians chose economic contraction as a virus-mitigation strategy. Historians will marvel…

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Forget About Covid, They Say

Forget About Covid, They Say

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By all means, forget about Covid and live life as normally as possible in defiance of those who live to foster fear. But, never forget the disastrous Covid restrictions that created such destruction. We cannot let anyone off the hook, much less pretend that the policy disaster that created billions of personal tragedies never happened. 

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Why Is Walensky Refusing to Answer this Senator’s Questions?

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According to Johnson, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Director Rochelle Walensky is one of the public health officials who has been non-compliant with his requests. To date, Johnson says he has made eight specific requests, directly of Walensky, that have gone unanswered.

Why Is Walensky Refusing to Answer this Senator’s Questions? Read Journal Article

digital-brownshirts

Digital Brownshirts and Their Masters

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Digital Brownshirts are just the most visible and forward-leaning elements of a much broader effort to install the logic of the algorithm—a providential and vertically-imposed concept of truth that vitiates traditional fact-finding and admits neither human intelligence nor scientific debate—as a cornerstone of our human interactions and cognitive processes.

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The Nudge: Ethically Dubious and Ineffective

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By going with the grain of how we think and act, the state-employed ‘nudgers’ can covertly shape our behaviour in a direction deemed desirable by the regime of the day – an appealing prospect for any government. The ubiquitous deployment of these behavioural strategies – which frequently rely on inflating emotional distress to change behaviour – raises profound moral questions.

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Public Health Erred on the Side of Catastrophe

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Overreaching public health officials and politicians—and the journalists-in-name-only who served as their mindless, unquestioning megaphones—have fully earned our withering condemnation. Indeed, holding them accountable is essential to sparing ourselves and future generations from repeating this dystopian chapter of human history.

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