This essay is a joint review of Jennifer Stisa Granick's, American Spies: Modern Surveillance, Why You Should Care, and What To Do About It, and Barry Friedman's, Unwarranted: Policing Without Permission

This paper focuses on some of the overlooked costs of war-related public research. We discuss two unseen consequences of war-related public science. The first is the distortionary effect of government-influenced research on academic disciplines. The second is the opportunity cost of the...

This paper focuses on some of the overlooked costs of war-related public research. We discuss two unseen consequences of war-related public science. The first is the distortionary effect of government-influenced research on academic disciplines. The second is the opportunity cost of the...

What role do whistleblowers play in democratic politics? This paper answers this question by analyzing the political economy of whistleblowing within democratic political institutions. Democratic politics is characterized by numerous principal-agent problems creating significant space for...

Non-violent action entails exerting power to bring about change through means which avoid the use of physical force. Examples include protests, boycotts, civil disobedience, and non-cooperation, among others. Although it is possible for a single individual to engage in non-violence, larger-scale...

This paper explores the connection between Hayek's dual problems of planning. Following Hayek we begin from the premise that the knowledge problem is ubiquitous. As Hayek argued, markets are effective at resolving the knowledge problem. However, where markets are absent, the knowledge problem...

James Buchanan's protective state emerges at the constitutional level and protects the core rights of citizens via internal security, contract enforcement, and defense against external threats. This paper focuses on the potential for the protective state to produce anti-liberty outcomes. I...

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments around the world adopted a variety of policies expanding the scope of their power. Some of these effects are immediate and observable. Others, however, are not readily observable and only appear over time. We explore these long-run consequences...

The U.S. government's covert drone program is a defining aspect of its military strategy in its transnational “War on Terror.” We highlight a fundamental paradox with the use of drones to combat terrorism. The U.S. government justifies drones as an efficient method for weakening, and...