JOHAN NORBERG QUOTES

Capitalism has given people both the liberty and the incentive to create, produce, and trade, thereby generating prosperity.

The growth of world prosperity is not a "miracle" or any of the other mystifying terms we customarily apply to countries that have succeeded economically and socially. Schools are not built, nor are incomes generated, by sheer luck, like a bolt from the blue. These things happen when people begin to think along new lines and work hard to bring their ideas to fruition. But people do that everywhere, and there is no reason why certain people in certain places during certain periods in history should be intrinsically smarter or more capable than others. What makes the difference is whether the environment permits and encourages ideas and work, or instead puts obstacles in their way. That depends on whether people are free to explore their way ahead, to own property, to invest for the long term, to conclude private agreements, and to trade with others. In short, it depends on whether or not the countries have capitalism.

JOHAN NORBERG, In Defense of Global Capitalism

When I say that I mean to defend capitalism, what I have in mind is the capitalistic freedom to proceed by trial and error, without having to ask rulers and border officials for permission first. That is the liberty that I once thought anarchy would bring, but under the control of laws ensuring that one person's freedom will not encroach on other people's. I want everyone to have that liberty in abundance. If the critics of capitalism feel that we already have a superabundance of that liberty today, I would like to have more still--a superduper abundance if possible--especially for the poor of the world's population, who as things now stand have little say regarding their work and consumption.