Bruno Leoni Institute
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Type | Think-Tank |
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Purpose | Ordoliberalism, Austrian School, Classical Liberalism |
Headquarters | Piazza Cavour 3, Turin Piazza Castello 23, Milan |
President | Franco Debenedetti |
Director General | Alberto Mingardi |
Key people | Carlo Lottieri, Nicola Rossi, Antonio Martino, Sergio Ricossa |
Affiliations | Cooler Heads Coalition, Atlas Network, EPICENTER |
Website | www |
The Bruno Leoni Institute, named after philosopher and scholar Bruno Leoni, is an Italian libertarian think-tank promoting classical liberal ideas in Italy and in Europe.
About
IBL was founded in 2003 by three libertarian scolars: Carlo Lottieri, Alberto Mingardi and Carlo Stagnaro. Based in Turin and Milan, it organizes conferences and seminars in many Italian cities, publishes books, briefing and academic papers and assists students at undergraduate and graduate levels with their research work. IBL aims to contribute to the Italian political discourse, to enable a proper appreciation of the role of liberty and private enterprise as pillars of a more prosperous and open society. It is structured on the model of the think tanks in the English-speaking world: non-profit research centers, with no political affiliations, aiming to offer a fruitful contribution to the political debate. The policy ideas promoted by IBL aim to create a greater “breathing space” for civil society and empower individuals, giving more resources back to businesses, and freeing competition and exchanges, to the benefit of the general welfare and increasing the wealth of society and its members.
IBL defines its own philosophy as follows: Our philosophy is given different names, such as “liberal”, “libertarian”, or “market-oriented”. The inspiration of the institute comes from Bruno Leoni, a great philosopher of law whose works and thought IBL spreads throughout Italy and abroad. IBL has dedicated the site “Rediscovering Bruno Leoni” to the figure of Bruno Leoni. In the world of real politics, we fight for solutions which offer breathing space to civil society, and which give resources back to the economy, while liberalizing competition and trade to the end of greater wellbeing and wealth for all.[1]
IBL is part of a broader international network of research centers informed by the same free-market approach: it joins the efforts of the Atlas Network and is a founding member of EPICENTER.[2]
Annual Liberalizations Index
Every year IBL publishes an index of the most remarkable liberalizations occurred through the 28 EU member states. It ranks the market opennes in 10 different sectors of the economy. In 2015 the sectors analyzed were: Fuel, Gas and Electricity, Labour, Postal Services, telecommunications, television, air transport, railways and insurances. When published, the index is always cited both by the media and the academia as a reliable source of information for policymakers and scholars.
Bruno Leoni Lecture
IBL organizes since 2008 a yearly “Discorso Bruno Leoni” (Bruno Leoni Lecture). The Discorso is among the flagship events of Istituto Bruno Leoni, as it strives to bring the Italian public up to date to the most relevant international debates. The Discorso Bruno Leoni is structured as an in-depth lecture by a distinguished scholar or author, in which a seminal optic is investigated from a free-market, individual liberty perspective.[3]
Over time speakers have included:
- 2008: Vernon L. Smith (Nobel laureate in Economics, 2002)
- 2009: Vaclav Klaus (Former President of the Czech Republic)
- 2009: Nassim Nicholas Taleb (Author of “The Black Swan”)
- 2010: Dambisa Moyo (Author of “Dead Aid”)
- 2011: John P. Taylor (Stanford University)
- 2012: Tyler Cowen (George Mason University)
- 2013: Antonin Scalia (Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court)
- 2014: Yang Jisheng (Journalist, Author of “Tombstone: The Great Chinese Famine, 1958-1962”)
- 2015: Jean Baechler (Emeritus Professor at University Paris-Sorbonne, author of “Origins of Capitalism”)
- 2016: Frank Easterbrook (Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit)
Bruno Leoni Award
Since 2008, every year the Bruno Leoni Institute attributes a "Bruno Leoni Award" dedicated to the thinker whose teachings the Institute refers to, and awarded to distinguished personalities. The award is intended to eminent figures who, through a recently published book, or with the work of a lifetime, have helped to advance the ideas of individual freedom, free market and free competition.[4]
Through time, it has been awarded to:
- 2008: Vernon L. Smith, Franco Debenedetti and Roberto Perotti
- 2009: Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Antonio Martino and Angelo Panebianco
- 2010: Boyden Gray, Alessandro Ortis, Carlo Scarpa, Paolo Bianchi, Bernardo Bortolotti and Laura Pellizzola
- 2011: Giuseppe Arena, Alessandro Penati, Lorenzo Pinna, Aldo Canovari and the Italian publishing house Liberilibri
- 2012: Piero Ostellino and the General Confederation of Italian Industry - Emilia Romagna section
- 2013: Nigel Lawson, Vincino and Giovanni Orsina
- 2014: Mario Vargas Llosa
- 2015: Richard Pipes
- 2016: Deirdre N. McCloskey
Main publications
- Alberto Mingardi (ed.) - Mito e realtà dei monopoli
- Carlo Stagnaro, Margo Thorning - Più energia per tutti
- Alberto Mingardi, Paolo Zanetto - Colpirne uno per educarne cento. Il caso Microsoft e il futuro della concorrenza in Europa
- Antonio Martino - Milton Friedman
- Bruno Leoni - La libertà del lavoro. Scritti su concorrenza, sciopero e serrata
- Nicola Iannello (ed.) - La società senza Stato. I fondatori del pensiero libertario
- Carlo Lottieri - Le ragioni del diritto. Libertà individuale e ordine giuridico nerl pensiero di Bruno Leoni
- Sergio Ricossa - La fine dell'economia
- Milton Friedman - Capitalismo e libertà
- Milton Friedman - Liberi di scegliere
- Ronald Coase - Sull'economia e gli economisti
- Ronald Coase - Come la Cina è diventata capitalista
- Friedrich A. Von Hayek - Contro Keynes
- Matt Ridley - Le origini della virtù
- Luigi Einaudi - In lode del profitto
- Joshua Hall - Homer Economicus
- Nicola Rossi (ed.) - Sudditi. Un programma per i prossimi 50 anni