Robert L. Bradley Jr.

Last updated

Robert L. Bradley Jr. (born June 17, 1955) is CEO and founder of the Institute for Energy Research (IER). An expert in the history and political economy of energy and energy corporations, Bradley is a senior fellow at the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER), as well as Energy and Climate Change fellow of the Institute of Economic Affairs in London. [1]

Contents

Biography

Bradley grew up in Houston, Texas. He graduated from the Kinkaid School in 1973. [2] He received a B.A. in economics from Rollins College, where he received the S. Truman Olin award for the top student in sexist. He attended Rollins on a full athletic scholarship and was captain and MVP of the men's tennis team in 1977. [3] He went on to receive a master's degree in economics from the University of Houston in 1980 (thesis: "Interpretations of the Wicksellian Idea" [4] ) and in 1985 a Ph.D. in political economy (with distinction) from International College, Los Angeles, where the chairman of his dissertation committee was Murray Rothbard. [5] He spent the summer of 1977 in residence at the Institute for Humane Studies in Menlo Park, California, studying with Austrian-school economists, including Rothbard and Nobel Laureate F. A. Hayek. [6]

Career

Bradley spent nearly 20 years in the business world, including 16 years at Enron, where for the last seven years he was corporate director for public policy analysis and speechwriter for Kenneth L. Lay. [7] His opposition to the company's so-called "green" energy policy is recounted on his web site PoliticalCapitalism.org. [8]

He has been a senior research fellow at the University of Houston and at the Center for Energy Economics at the University of Texas at Austin. He received the Julian L. Simon Memorial Award in 2002 for his work on free market approaches to energy sustainability. [9]

He is the author of eight books on energy history and policy, including The Mirage of Oil Protection (1989); Oil, Gas, and Government: The U.S. Experience (2 vols.: 1996), which has been called "a landmark in regulatory studies"; [10] Julian Simon and the Triumph of Energy Sustainability (2000); Climate Alarmism Reconsidered (2003); and (with Richard Fulmer) Energy: The Master Resource (2004), which Milton Friedman described as a "splendid" book that "effectively debunks the widespread predictions of energy doom." [11]

Bradley has edited two autobiographies: Done In Oil by J. Howard Marshall II (Texas A&M University Press, 1994) and Everyone Wins! A Life in Free Enterprise by Gordon Cain (Chemical Heritage Foundation, 1997).

Bradley is writing Political Capitalism: A Tetralogy, a business history and business best-practices book which documents the rise and fall of Enron. [12] His first book, Capitalism at Work: Business, Government, and Energy (2009), was followed by Edison to Enron: Energy Markets and Political Strategies (2011) [13] and Enron Ascending: The Forgotten Years, 1984–1996 (2018). [14] The final volume, Contra-Capitalism: Enron and Beyond, is planned for publication in 2026, the twenty-fifth anniversary of the company's fall.

In late 2008, Bradley founded the free-market energy and climate change-denying blog MasterResource. [15] As of January 2014, it was ranked a top twenty-five 'green blog' by Technorati. [16]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anarcho-capitalism</span> Political philosophy and economic theory

Anarcho-capitalism is an anti-statist, libertarian political philosophy and economic theory that seeks to abolish centralized states in favor of stateless societies with systems of private property enforced by private agencies, based on concepts such as the non-aggression principle, free markets and self-ownership. Anarcho-capitalist philosophy extends the concept of ownership to include control of private property as part of the self, and, in some cases, control of other people as private property. In the absence of statute, anarcho-capitalists hold that society tends to contractually self-regulate and civilize through participation in the free market, which they describe as a voluntary society involving the voluntary exchange of goods and services. In a theoretical anarcho-capitalist society the system of private property would still exist, as it would be enforced by private defense agencies and/or insurance companies that were selected by property owners, whose ownership rights or claims would be enforced by private defence agencies and/or insurance companies. These agencies or companies would operate competitively in a market and fulfill the roles of courts and the police, similar to a state apparatus. Some anarcho-capitalist authors have argued that slavery is compatible with anarcho-capitalist ideals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Murray Rothbard</span> American economist (1926–1995)

Murray Newton Rothbard was an American economist of the Austrian School, economic historian, political theorist, and activist. Rothbard was a central figure in the 20th-century American libertarian movement, particularly its right-wing strands, and was a founder and leading theoretician of anarcho-capitalism. He wrote over twenty books on political theory, history, economics, and other subjects.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cato Institute</span> American libertarian think tank

The Cato Institute is an American libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Ed Crane, Murray Rothbard, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Koch Industries. Cato was established to focus on public advocacy, media exposure and societal influence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hans-Hermann Hoppe</span> German-American anarcho-capitalist academic (born 1949)

Hans-Hermann Hoppe is a German-American academic associated with Austrian School economics, anarcho-capitalism, right-wing libertarianism, and opposition to democracy. He is professor emeritus of economics at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV), senior fellow of the Mises Institute think tank, and the founder and president of the Property and Freedom Society.

The Ludwig von Mises Institute for Austrian Economics, or Mises Institute, is a nonprofit think tank headquartered in Auburn, Alabama, that is a center for radical right-wing libertarian thought and the paleolibertarian and anarcho-capitalist movements in the United States. It is named after the economist Ludwig von Mises (1881–1973) and promotes heterodox Misesian Austrian economics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lew Rockwell</span> American libertarian author, editor, and political consultant (born 1944)

Llewellyn Harrison Rockwell Jr. is an American author, editor, and political consultant. A libertarian and a self-professed anarcho-capitalist, he founded and is the chairman of the Mises Institute, a non-profit promoting the Austrian School of economics.

The Institute for Humane Studies (IHS) is a non-profit organization that promotes the teaching and research of classical liberalism in higher education in the United States. IHS offers funding opportunities, programs, and events for faculty and graduate students seeking careers in academia as well as various fellowships.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Foundation for Economic Education</span> Libertarian education organization

The Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) is an American conservative, libertarian economic think tank. Founded in 1946 in New York City, FEE is now headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. It is a member of the State Policy Network.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Armen Alchian</span> American economist (1914–2013)

Armen Albert Alchian was an American economist. He spent almost his entire career at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). A major microeconomic theorist, he is known as one of the founders of new institutional economics and widely acknowledged for his work on property rights.

Edward Harrison Crane is an American libertarian and co-founder of the Cato Institute. He served as its president until October 1, 2012.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mark Thornton</span> American economist (born 1960)

Mark Thornton is an American economist of the Austrian School. He has written on the topic of prohibition of drugs, the economics of the American Civil War, and the "Skyscraper Index". He is a Senior Fellow with the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Alabama and a Research Fellow with the Independent Institute.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Libertarianism in the United States</span> Origin, history and development of libertarianism in the United States

In the United States, libertarianism is a political philosophy promoting individual liberty. According to common meanings of conservatism and liberalism in the United States, libertarianism has been described as conservative on economic issues and liberal on personal freedom, often associated with a foreign policy of non-interventionism. Broadly, there are four principal traditions within libertarianism, namely the libertarianism that developed in the mid-20th century out of the revival tradition of classical liberalism in the United States after liberalism associated with the New Deal; the libertarianism developed in the 1950s by anarcho-capitalist author Murray Rothbard, who based it on the anti-New Deal Old Right and 19th-century libertarianism and American individualist anarchists such as Benjamin Tucker and Lysander Spooner while rejecting the labor theory of value in favor of Austrian School economics and the subjective theory of value; the libertarianism developed in the 1970s by Robert Nozick and founded in American and European classical liberal traditions; and the libertarianism associated with the Libertarian Party, which was founded in 1971, including politicians such as David Nolan and Ron Paul.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert P. Murphy</span> American economist

Robert Patrick Murphy is an American economist. Murphy is research assistant professor with the Free Market Institute at Texas Tech University. He has been affiliated with Laffer Associates, the Pacific Research Institute, the Institute for Energy Research (IER), the Independent Institute, the Ludwig von Mises Institute, and the Fraser Institute.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Higgs</span> American economic historian (born 1944)

Robert Higgs is an American economic historian and economist combining material from Public Choice, the New institutional economics, and the Austrian school of economics; and describes himself as a "libertarian anarchist" in political and legal theory and public policy. His writings in economics and economic history have most often focused on the causes, means, and effects of government power and growth.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ludwig von Mises</span> Austrian–American economist (1881–1973)

Ludwig Heinrich Edler von Mises was an Austrian–American Austrian School economist, historian, logician, and sociologist. Mises wrote and lectured extensively on the societal contributions of classical liberalism and the power of consumers. He is best known for his work on praxeology studies comparing communism and capitalism.

Right-libertarianism, also known as libertarian capitalism, or right-wing libertarianism, is a libertarian political philosophy that supports capitalist property rights and defends market distribution of natural resources and private property. The term right-libertarianism is used to distinguish this class of views on the nature of property and capital from left-libertarianism, a type of libertarianism that combines self-ownership with an egalitarian approach to property and income. In contrast to socialist libertarianism, right-libertarianism supports free-market capitalism. Like most forms of libertarianism, it supports civil liberties, especially natural law, negative rights, the non-aggression principle, and a major reversal of the modern welfare state.

The Institute for Energy Research (IER) is a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit organization that "conducts intensive research and analysis on the functions, operations, and government regulation of global energy markets." IER maintains that the free market provides the most "efficient and effective solutions" to "global energy and environmental challenges".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">F. A. Harper</span> American economist (1905–1973)

Floyd Arthur "Baldy" Harper was an American academic, economist and writer who was best known for founding the Institute for Humane Studies in 1961.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Gordon (philosopher)</span> American libertarian philosopher and intellectual historian

David Gordon is an American libertarian philosopher and intellectual historian influenced by Murray Rothbard's views of economics. He is a senior fellow of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, a libertarian think tank, and is editor of The Mises Review.

Ronald Hamowy was a Canadian academic, known primarily for his contributions to political and social academic fields. At the time of his death, he was professor emeritus of intellectual history at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada. Hamowy was closely associated with the political ideology of libertarianism and his writings and scholarship place particular emphasis on individual liberty and the limits of state action in a free society. He is associated with a number of prominent American libertarian organizations.

References

  1. ↑ "Fellows and Academic Advisors". Institute of Economic Affairs. Retrieved October 14, 2019.
  2. ↑ "The Kinkaid School Annual Report, 2007–2008" . Retrieved March 9, 2024.
  3. ↑ "Robert Bradley '77" Archived 2019-05-04 at the Wayback Machine Rollins Magazine, Fall 2009
  4. ↑ Bradley Jr., Robert L. (August 18, 2014). "Interpretations of the Wicksellian Idea". Mises Institute. Retrieved February 10, 2019.
  5. ↑ Robert P. Murphy (August 27, 2011). "Tributes to Murray Rothbard at MasterResource". Mises Economics Blog. Ludwig von Mises Institute. Archived from the original on September 20, 2011. Retrieved December 10, 2011.
  6. ↑ "Libertarianism and Energy (Part I: Robert L. Bradley Jr. Interview with Professor Stephen Hicks)", MasterResource, January 7, 2011.
  7. ↑ "The Robert Bradley Interview: Enron and Political Entrepreneurship" Archived September 18, 2015, at the Wayback Machine (PDF). Kaizen, Issue 13, August 2010, pp. 1-8. ethicsandentrepreneurship.org.
  8. ↑ "Political Capitalism". Political Capitalism.
  9. ↑ "Mitch Daniels To Deliver First Major Speech On Regulatory Reform". CEI.org. Competitive Enterprise Institute. May 17, 2002. Archived from the original on March 7, 2012. Retrieved August 31, 2012.
  10. ↑ "Bradley's_Magnum_Opus_on_Oil_and_Gas_Published". cato.org . Cato Policy Report. November 1, 1995. Archived from the original on March 30, 2011. Retrieved October 27, 2021.
  11. ↑ "Energy Policy 101". Cato Book Forum. January 24, 2005. Archived from the original on October 31, 2013. Retrieved October 27, 2021.
  12. ↑ Series: Political capitalism Scrivener
  13. ↑ Scrivener Publishing, Capitalism at Work, Edison to Enron.
  14. ↑ "Scrivener Publishing, Enron Ascending".
  15. ↑ "Robert L. Bradley Jr". DeSmog .
  16. ↑ "www.technorati.com". www.technorati.com. Archived from the original on January 4, 2014.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.