2008 Bastiat Prize Finalists Announced

London, 5 August 2008 – International Policy Network today announced the six finalists for the seventh annual Bastiat Prize for Journalism. The Prize – named in honour of the great 19th-Century French philosopher and essayist Frédéric Bastiat – celebrates writers whose work clearly and wittily promotes the institutions of the free society.

“This year, we received over 250 submissions from writers in more than 50 countries, including many published in the world’s top newspapers and magazines. The quality of submissions was excellent, and we feel that the final six all show a deep understanding of the institutions of the free society and an acute ability to communicate their importance to a general audience. The final decision is now in the hands of our eminent judges – which include former winners, Brian Carney and Amity Shlaes, and the former Chancellor of the British Exchequer, Nigel Lawson. We look forward to announcing this year’s winners at the Bastiat Prize dinner on October 22,” said IPN Executive Director, Julian Morris.

The 2008 finalists:

Swaminathan S. Anklesaria Aiyar, Consulting Editor, Economic Times. Times of India

Tyler Cowen, Professor of Economics, George Mason University
New York Times columnist

A. Barton Hinkle
Deputy Op-Ed Editor, Richmond Times-Dispatch, USA

Fraser Nelson, Political Editor, The Spectator,UK; The Business, UK; Daily Telegraph, UK

Ashutosh Tiwari, CEO, Himalmedia
Nepali Times Business Columnist, Nepal

Daniel Weintraub,
Public Affairs Columnist
Sacramento Bee, USA

The first, second and third prize winners will be announced at the Bastiat Prize Dinner in New York on 22 October 2008. The winner will receive US$10,000 and an engraved candlestick. Second and third prize winners will receive $4,000 and $1,000 respectively, as well as an engraved candlestick.

The Bastiat Prize was first awarded in 2002 and judges have included Lady Thatcher and Nobel-Prize-winners James Buchanan and Milton Friedman.

This year’s panel of judges is:

Anne Applebaum (Editorial Board member, Washington Post)
Brian Carney (Editorial Board member, Wall Street Journal)
Professor Bibek Debroy (International Management Institute, India)
Judge Douglas Ginsburg (Washington DC Court of Appeals)
Lord Lawson (Former British Chancellor of the Exchequer)
Matt Ridley (Author on genetics and human behaviour)
Amity Shlaes (Syndicated Bloomberg columnist; visiting senior fellow, Council on Foreign Relations)

Last year’s Bastiat prize winner was Amit Varma for his articles in Mint India. Clive Crook, senior editor of The Atlantic Monthly and Associate Editor of the Financial Times, and Jonah Goldberg of National Review Online were placed second and third respectively.

Previous Bastiat winners include
Tim Harford of the Financial Times and Jamie Whyte, for articles written in The Times, UK
Mary Anastasia O’Grady of the Wall Street Journal
Amity Shlaes, then with the Financial Times
Robert Guest, The Economist
Sauvik Chakraverti, Economic Times of India and
Brian Carney, then with the Wall Street Journal Europe

Entries for the Bastiat Prize are judged on intellectual content, persuasiveness of language used, and their clarity to the intelligent layman. The Prize is open to all writers in English, anywhere in the world. The prize was developed to encourage and reward writers whose published works promote the institutions of a free society: limited government, rule of law brokered by an independent judiciary, protection of private property, free markets, free speech, and sound science.

The Bastiat Prize is sponsored by International Policy Network (IPN), a London-based think tank that seeks to improve public understanding of the role of the institutions of the free society. For more on IPN and the Bastiat Prize, please browse: www.policynetwork.net and www.bastiatprize.org