Developing countries in Africa and the Caribbean continue to press the United Kingdom for reparations, believing that financial compensation will rejuvenate their economies.

[The Struggle for Liberty: A Libertarian History of Political Thought by Ralph Raico. Edited by Ryan McMaken. Ludwig von Mises Institute, 2025; 287 pp.]

The first time I read about “white privilege” in college was on a Blackboard assigned readings list. This was not a class I attended, but had access to in order to provide some help to the professor. As it turned out, I had read the original paper on this topic: Peggy McIntosh’s “White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming to See Correspondences Through Work in Women’s Studies” (1988).

While much has been written about the “vibe shift” in America since Trump’s reelection, an almost equal feeling of change has recently been felt in British politics.

[Editor’s note: In this selection from The Struggle for Liberty: A Libertarian History of Political Thought, Ralph Raico introduces the idea that western Europe was unique in how it approached the power of civil government and sought to limit it.

In Das Kapital, Karl Marx outlined a historical progression of socioeconomic systems: tribal communism, slave societies, feudalism, capitalism, socialism, and communism. However, one notable omission from this framework is mercantilism. Why was it left out? While mercantilism and capitalism overlap, they are distinct systems with different economic policies, modes of production, and underlying principles. By omitting mercantilism, Marx could attribute its exploitative practices—particularly colonialism—directly to capitalism, reinforcing his ideological critique.

American History is the source of many enduring myths. George Washington didn’t chop down the cherry tree, Abraham Lincoln did not free the slaves (or even end slavery in this country), and Jim Crow was not the natural heir to post-war policies in the South in the 1860s and 70s.