Happy New
Year!
If I had
asked myself at the beginning of 2025 what questions I should focus over the
next 12 months I would have mentioned the implications of declining economic
growth rates in high income countries. I
have been particularly interested in the consequences of an increasing
proportion of the populations of high-income countries coming to feel that
their standard of living is worse than that of their parents at a comparable
age. My research suggests that people tend to feel miserable when they assess
their standard of living to be lower than that of their parents. I wrote
several essays on that topic, including one entitled: How
difficult would it be for individuals to adjust to zero economic growth?
I would not
have predicted at the beginning of 2025 that during the year I would write an
essay entitled: Are
integralists opposed to natural rights? That was my most popular essay for
the year, with over 4,000 views.
My interest
in integralists followed serendipitously from my interest in the role of
political entrepreneurship in institutional change. At the beginning of
2025 I was concerned to obtain a better understanding of political
entrepreneurship because there seemed to be increasing support in liberal
democracies for leaders who proposed changes in the rules of the game which
were likely to have detrimental impacts on prospects for individual
flourishing. Some essays I wrote on the topic attracted over 3,900 views. I revised
those essays during the year and published a series of essays in November addressing
issues related to the question: What
impact does political entrepreneurship have on freedom and flourishing?
I would not
have predicted at the beginning of 2025 that I would have the opportunity to
publish four scholarly essays by Edward W. Younkins, on topics that are central
to the purpose of this blog. An essay
reviewing books by David L. Norton, was published here in
January, a review of Chris Matthew Sciabarra’s book “Total Freedom” was published here in
July, an essay entitled, “How can Austrian Economics be reconciled with the
Neo-Aristotelian philosophy of Freedom and Flourishing?”, was published here in
October, and an essay entitled, “Can Polarized Moral Politics be Bridged by a
Neo-Aristotelian Philosophy of Freedom and Flourishing”, was published here
in December. Those essays have all attracted a substantial number of readers.
What
next?
It may be possible
to predict what I will write about in 2026 from topics that I wish I could
understand more fully. Those topics may provide the focus for my future
reading.
In a recent
post, I have already foreshadowed further
reading related to political entrepreneurship and institutional change.
I also feel
the need to improve my understanding of the implications of rapid advances in AI. I wrote a series of essays about robots and AI in 2015 and 2016 (one of the
better ones is here
) but a lot has happened since then.
Another
topic I would like to be able to understand is why birth rates are now below
replacement levels in many high-income countries. Can this be attributed to economic insecurity, or has there been a fundamental change in
values? Does it pose a threat to civilization, as some have suggested? Does it pose a problem for those of us who believe that human flourishing is an inherently self-directed process?
I don’t
expect to be able to push back the frontiers of knowledge in any of the areas
mentioned above but it would be nice to end the year with a better understanding
of some of the issues involved.
It will be interesting to look back at the end of 2026 to what I have actually written about. I imagine the range of topics touched upon will be broader than the topics listed above. I also hope to be given the opportunity to publish more high-quality guest essays that are consistent with the purposes of this blog.
