“After the Second World War, a vast array of international and national institutions—the United Nations, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and a host of nongovernment and government aid organizations—was created to better the lot of the world’s poor.  Conventional wisdom came to hold that improvements in infrastructure, technology, capital markets, education, and health care would eliminate the stark distinctions between rich and poor nations.  Fifty years and billions of dollars later, this wisdom has proved wrong.”  Bill Lewis

In 1990, the international consulting firm McKinsey & Company founded a think tank to help the company navigate the unchartered waters of globalization.  Because individual companies are the ultimate sources of growth and job creation, Lewis decided to find out why companies around the world operate as they do.  Ten years of research led Lewis to conclusions that took him by surprise and spurred him to write a book that summarizes them in the title, The Power of Productivity.

What poor countries need to do, says Lewis, is to increase productivity.  How?  Chuck policies that distort competition and create a level playing field.  What about education levels, labor, and capital markets?  Overestimated, concludes Lewis.  What is most important is how a country organizes and deploys its resources, not aggregate amounts.  What keeps countries from implementing policies that foster competition?  “Countries follow bad policies, above all, because they benefit powerful or well-connected people,” Lewis says.  “Only one force can stand up to producer special interest—consumer interests.  Most poor countries are a long way from a consumption mindset and consumer rights.  As a result, they are poor.” 

An Amazon customer review put it best:  “This should be required reading for the key political leaders and policy makers in the developing world.  I can’t think of a better self-help guide.” 

• Watch Lewis speak at UFM on why productivity varies around the world
• Watch interview with Bill Lewis on ideas that foster prosperity

The above interview is available on YouTube in two parts

• Interview with Bill Lewis Part I
• Interview with Bill Lewis Part II

It was an encounter with one of the most optimistic and creative people in the world.  UFM’s auditorium was packed: young/old, conservative/bohemian, techno savants/techno dummies. 

In just six years Wikipedia has become the sixth largest website in the world, with 250,000 volunteers.  A study by Nature shows the accuracy of its science entries rivals Britannica’s.  In 2006, Time ranked Wales among the world’s 100 most influential people. 

At UFM, Wales captivated the audience as he talked in detail about the beginnings of Wikipedia, its development, reliability, community of volunteers, wikis, his ideas about the free software movement, free culture, collaborative efforts, peace, and human action. 

UFM founders and Wales share a libertarian vision.  Wales’ central inspiration for Wikipedia was the famous essay by Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek, The Use of Knowledge in Society (he read it as a finance student at Auburn University).  In an article on Wales for Reason magazine, Katherine Mangu-Ward quotes an entry posted by Wales on Lawrence Lessig’s blog: “One can’t understand my ideas about Wikipedia without understanding Hayek.” 

Hayek’s idea?  That the spontaneous interaction of individuals, without the intervention of a central authority, is the most efficient way to create systems that can achieve complex goals.  In one of the courses required of all UFM students, regardless of discipline, readings include the very same Hayek essay that inspired Wales’ design for Wikipedia.  This course analyzes the evolution of the concept of liberty, rule of law, and the creative power of the free society. 

Wales’ latest challenge?  Wikia, a for-profit venture based on the same idea of collaborative communities that accumulate and share knowledge in a self-governed world of spontaneously evolving order.

• Collection of four videos of Jimmy Wales at UFM by New Media Center
  Includes:
  • Address at UFM on Wikipedia, free culture, and Creative Commons [good stuff in the Q & A]
  • Talk on Wikipedia at UFM luncheon
  • Interview about Wikipedia, knowledge, and Friedrich Hayek
  • Interview about technology associated with Wikipedia

The two interviews above are also at these links on YouTube

• Wikipedia, information, incentives and Friedrich Hayek
• Technology associated with Wikipedia

Jimmy Wales visited UFM as a board member of Creative Commons International to inaugurate the Creative Commons project in Guatemala.  His talk at UFM was the official introduction of Creative Commons in Guatemala.

Creative Commons is another great example of what people can achieve when they work together, free of central authority, to seek a solution to a complex problem. 

The problem?  How to address the moral and legal challenges presented to intellectual property rights by new media.  

The nonprofit Creative Commons has developed an alternative to the traditional all-or-nothing approach to licensing intellectual property for use and distribution.  The voluntary system of licenses, with wording tailored to the laws of some fifty countries, is setting legal precedents in courts around the world.  Among its most famous users are MIT OpenCourseWork and some 90 million photographs on Flickr.

Creative Commons International is developing its project in Guatemala jointly with the New Media Center at Universidad Francisco Marroquín.

Creative Commons links

• Sitio de Creative Commons Guatemala (español)
• Creative Commons homepage (English)

It was the second visit to UFM for Charles Murray and his wife Catherine Cox, who had attended the Mont Pelerin Society meeting here in 2005. 

On the evening before every commencement, UFM holds a special ceremony for those graduating with honors and their families.  Charles Murray talked to the honor students about learning and wisdom.  The following day at commencement, he came up with some unconventional advice for the graduating class: “Next week get a one-way airplane ticket to any interesting country in the world.  Take a little money with you, get off the plane and get a job, any job.  Then live there, supporting yourself.”  The experience of leaving their “bubble” and conquering a strange place will serve them well in life.  His final offering was his short list for a successful life: find the right person to marry and love what you do for a living.

Charles Murray has spent most of his professional life challenging accepted notions of public and social policy. In his latest book, he challenges the wishful thinking that permeates judgments and policies regarding “education.”  In Real Education: Four Simple Truths for Bringing America’s Schools Back to Reality, he takes on myths and the damage they do.  The four basic truths?  Ability varies, half of the children are below average, too many people are going to college, and America’s future depends on how we educate the academically gifted.

Charles masterfully synthesizes his thesis and conclusions in an engaging and moving 19-minute video, taped during this latest visit to UFM.  It is well worth a look.

In a lengthy interview by Carlisle Johnson, he gives a peek at the intellectual path he is currently following: “It’s an issue that I’ve been thinking about for years; trying to untangle these contradictory aspects of American culture.  In some ways, the culture remains very vital, full of energy, full of creativity.  In other ways, a lot of the classical definitions of decadence apply to American culture.  It’s not a simple picture.  Where do we stand on the trajectory?”

• Watch Murray’s great 19-minute synthesis of Real Education
  
  
• Watch Murray address honor graduates on learning and wisdom
  
  
• Watch Murray’s commencement address to graduating class [click on “Palabras de exhortación a estudiantes, por Charles Murray” in the index on the right]
  
  
• Watch 50-minute interview by Carlisle Johnson about lots of stuff
  
  
• Watch short interview about Real Education

Looking for books to give for Christmas?  Murray’s are all engaging reads and sure to fire the intellect.  UFM president Giancarlo Ibárguen’s graduation day eulogy includes an annotated list [here]