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Eric Mack Subscribe

Eric Mack is Professor of Philosophy and Faculty Member of the Murphy Institute of Political Economy at Tulane University. He writes primarily on natural rights theory, property rights and economic justice, and the scope of legitimate coercive institutions.

September 8, 2013|Common Law, Constitutionalism, Friedrich Hayek, Law-Legislation and Liberty, Social Justice, Spontaneous Order, The Constitution of Liberty

Law, Legislation and Liberty

by Eric Mack|

Friedrich Hayek
This Liberty Law Talk is with philosopher Eric Mack on Friedrich Hayek's 1973 magnum opus, Law, Legislation and Liberty. Hayek's significant trilogy distinguishes between law and legislation, considers the appropriate rule of judges within a spontaneous order, observes the difficulties of even defining social justice, and attempts to set forth the principles of a new constitutional order for a free people. This conversation considers at length the major ideas that Hayek advances in his incredible work on the principles of law and just order.

April 1, 2013|

Social Justice is the State

by Eric Mack|

In response to: What is Social Justice?

Lamartine in front of the Town Hall of Paris rejects the red flag on 25 February 1848.

Samuel Gregg’s essay, “What is Social Justice?” is an important reminder that many different moral traditions – including the Catholic natural law tradition – may lay claim to the vocabulary of “social justice” and to an associated notion of the “common good.”  As articulated by Gregg, this natural law tradition can employ the language of “social justice” without construing social justice as fundamentally a call for an egalitarian or egalitarian-leaning distribution of material well-being or material resources that are conducive to material well-being.  That natural law tradition offers a thick understanding of human well-being and of the sort of social…

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More Responses

Social Justice Theory: A Solution in Search of a Problem

by David C. Rose

What is social justice? Sam Gregg’s essay answers this question by reviewing the origins and evolution of the concept. I find little to quibble with in Sam’s remarks and I am certainly in no position to make them a fortiori. My contribution will therefore be to offer an explanation for why social justice theory is both…

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November 20, 2012|Difference Principle, Economic Liberties, Free Market Fairness, John Rawls, John Tomasi, Property Rights, Social Justice

John Tomasi’s Free Market Synthesitis

by Eric Mack|

John Tomasi’s Free Market Fairness[1] has the intellectual ambition of formulating a synthesis – at least a tentative synthesis — of key elements of libertarian or classical liberal thought on the one hand and social democrat thought on the other hand.  From the former Tomasi purports to take robust economic rights that have a strong claim on being recognized within any acceptable social-political order and an appreciation of the beneficial outcomes of spontaneous orders; and from the latter, he takes a strong commitment to “social justice” that is understood in difference principle fashion as a commitment to making the worst off members of society as well off as possible. 

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Book Reviews

A Mirror of the 20th-Century Congress

by Joseph Postell

Wright undermined the very basis of his local popularity—the decentralized nature of the House—by supporting reforms that gave power to the party leaders.

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The Graces of Flannery O'Connor

by Henry T. Edmondson III

O'Connor's correspondence is a goldmine of piercing insight and startling reflections on everything from literature to philosophy to raising peacocks.

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Liberty Classics

Rereading Politica in the Post-Liberal Moment

by Glenn A. Moots

Althusius offers a rich constitutionalism that empowers persons to thrive alongside one another in deliberate communities.

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James Fenimore Cooper and the American Experiment

by Melissa Matthes

In The American Democrat, James Fenimore Cooper defended democracy against both mob rule and majority tyranny.

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Podcasts

Stuck With Decadence

A discussion with Ross Douthat

Ross Douthat discusses with Richard Reinsch his new book The Decadent Society.

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Can the Postmodern Natural Law Remedy Our Failing Humanism?

A discussion with Graham McAleer

Graham McAleer discusses how postmodern natural law can help us think more coherently about human beings and our actions.

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Did the Civil Rights Constitution Distort American Politics?

A discussion with Christopher Caldwell

Christopher Caldwell discusses his new book, The Age of Entitlement.

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America, Land of Deformed Institutions

A discussion with Yuval Levin

Yuval Levin pinpoints that American alienation and anger emerges from our weak political, social, and religious institutions.

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Recent Posts

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  • The Environmental Uncertainty Principle

    By engaging in such flagrant projection, the Times has highlighted once again the problem with groupthink in the climate discussion.
    by Paul Schwennesen

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