Mont Pelerin Society

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The Mont Pelerin Society (MPS) is an international organization composed of economists, intellectuals, business leaders, and others who favour economic liberalism. The society advocates free market economic policies and the political values of an "open society." The Mont Pelerin Society was created on April 10, 1947 at a conference organized by Friedrich Hayek. Originally, it was to be named the Acton-Tocqueville Society. After Frank Knight protested against naming the group after two "Roman Catholic Aristocrats" and Ludwig von Mises expressed concern that the mistakes made by Acton and Tocqueville in their lifetimes would be connected with the society, the name of the Swiss resort where it convened was used instead.

1 History
2 List of participants
3 Influence
4 External links
5 See also

[edit] History

In 1947, 39 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 classical liberalism and to combat the “state ascendancy and Marxist or Keynesian planning [that was] sweeping the globe”. Invitees included Henry Simons (who would later train Milton Friedman, a future president of the society, at the University of Chicago); the American former-Fabian socialist Walter Lippmann; 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 Habsburg, 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."

"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.

The Mont Pelerin Society has continued to meet on a regular basis, usually in September. The current president of the Mont Pelerin Society is Greg Lindsay.

MPS has close ties to the network of think tanks sponsored in part by the Atlas Economic Research Foundation.

[edit] List of participants

The original participants were

Maurice Allais, French physicist and economist
Carlo Antoni,
Hans Barth,
Karl Brandt, German-American agricultural economist
Herbert Cornuelle
John Davenport,
Stanley Dennison, British economist
Aaron Director, professor at the University of Chicago Law School
Walter Eucken, German economist, father of ordoliberalism
Erick Eyck,
Milton Friedman, American economist
Harry Gideonse,
Frank Graham,
Friedrich Hayek, Austrian economist
Henry Hazlitt, libertarian philosopher, economist and journalist
Floyd Harper,
Trygve Hoff, Norwegian economist and journalist
Albert Hunold,
Carl Iversen, Danish economist
John Jewkes, English economist
Bertrand de Jouvenel, French philosopher and political economist
Frank Knight, Chicago school economist
Fritz Machlup, Austrian-American economist
Salvador de Madariaga, Spanish diplomat and writer
Henri de Lovinfosse,
Loren Miller, civic reformer and libertarian activist
Ludwig von Mises, economist
Felix Morley,
Michael Polanyi, Hungaria/English chemist, economist and philosopher of science
Karl Popper, Austrian / British philosopher
William Rappard, academic and diplomat
Leonard Read, founder, Foundation for Economic Education
George Révay,
Lionel Robbins, British economist
Wilhelm Röpke, social market economist
George Joseph Stigler, U.S. economist
Herbert Tingsten, Swedist political scientist and journalist
François Trevoux,
Orval Watts,
Cicely Wedgwood.

Board of Directors 2006-2008

Greg Lindsay, President (Australia)
Victoria Curzon-Price, Senior Vice President (Switzerland)
Carl-Johan Westholm, Secretary (Sweden)
Edwin J. Feulner, Treasurer (USA) )
Leonard Liggio, Vice President (USA)
Eduardo Mayora, Vice President (Guatemala)
Jean-Pierre Centi, Vice President (France)
Ruth Richardson, Vice President (New Zealand)
Eamonn Butler, Director (UK)
Peter Kurrild-Klitgaard, Director (Denmark)
Michael Zoller, Director (Germany)
Linda Whetstone, Director (UK)
Enrique Ghersi, Director (Peru)
J.R. Clark, Director {USA}
Hiromitsu Ishi, Director (Japan)

[edit] Influence

Hayek stressed that the society was to be a scholarly community arguing against "collectivism", while not engaging in public relations or propaganda. However, the society has always been a focal point for the international capitalist think-tank movement: Hayek himself used it as a forum to encourage members such as Antony Fisher to pursue the think-tank route. Fisher went on to 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 Public Policy Research.

Prominent MPS members who have advanced to policy positions include Chancellor Ludwig Erhard of West Germany, President Luigi Einaudi of Italy, Chairman Arthur F. Burns of the U.S. Federal Reserve Board, U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz, Foreign Secretary Sir Geoffrey Howe of the U.K., Italian Minister of Defence Antonio Martino, Chilean Finance Minister Carlos Cáceres, New Zealand Finance Minister Ruth Richardson and President Václav Klaus of the Czech Republic. Eight MPS members, F. A. Hayek, Milton Friedman, George Stigler, Maurice Allais, James M. Buchanan, Ronald Coase, Gary S. Becker and Vernon Smith have won Nobel prizes in economics. Of 76 economic advisers on Ronald Reagan's 1980 campaign staff, 22 were MPS members.

The Property and Freedom Society (PFS), an international organization created for the global promotion of "Austro-Libertarianism," was formed by Hans-Hermann Hoppe in 2005. Declared ideological influences include MPS member Ludwig von Mises, as well as Frederic Bastiat, Gustave de Molinari, and Murray N. Rothbard. According to Paul Belien of The Brussels Journal,

The PFS takes some of its inspiration from the establishment in 1947 by Friedrich von Hayek (1899-1992) of the Mont Pelerin Society (MPS) [...] The MPS still continues the fight for a free society. However, some feel a more radical organisation of "culturally conservative libertarians" is needed now that the MPS has become so large and diverse.[1]