While the reading public appreciates Thomas Sowell—author of four of the top 100 economics books on Amazon—he is underappreciated by academic economists. This essay focuses on the seminal contributions of his “culture” books—Race and Culture, Migrations and Cultures, and Conquests and Cultures, as well as his insights in three other books Knowledge and Decisions, Intellectuals and Society, and A Conflict of Visions. In all these works, Sowell has little patience with the “rampaging presumptions” of intellectuals who think themselves fit to rule.

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Art Carden is a Research Fellow at the Independent Institute and an Associate Professor of Economics at Samford University.
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Brian C. Albrecht is chief economist at the International Center for Law & Economics.
EconomistsEconomyPhilosophy and Religion
Other Independent Review articles by Art Carden
Spring 2023 The Creation of Knowledge in Society: Waste Defined by Property and Exchange
Spring 2022 “The Danger of Deplorable Reactions”: W. H. Hutt on Liberalism, Populism, and the Constitutional Political Economy of Racism
Summer 2017 We’ll Never Be Royals, but That Doesn’t Matter
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