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What does it actually mean to run a think tank, to create harmony within an office building full of idea-confident folk? Some have called the think tank a monastery, some have called it an academic social club, and some have even called it a policy incubator. What truly is it and how on earth do you lead one?

Leading a think tank is a multifaceted job, because you have your own scholarship to do too. Today, I’m excited to welcome the president of AEI, Robert Doar, to the podcast for a similarly multifaceted conversation. Doar talks to us about his work on poverty and, more recently, the Nixon impeachment, as well as his job as the president of AEI. Stay with us till the end to hear us talking about our favorite books!


Want to explore more?

• Daniel Rothschild on Liberalism and Think Tanks, a Great Antidote podcast.
• Yesim Sayin on the DC Life and Policy, a Great Antidote podcast.
• Undivide Us: Ben Klutsey on Exploring and Confronting Polarization, a Great Antidote podcast.
• Max Borders, Can We Have Welfare Without the Threat of Violence? at Econlib.
• Richard Gunderman, Joy in Economics...And Tolstoy? at Econlib.

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Even though I hope you’ve been avoiding the election news like I have (as you would the plague), admittedly, it’s hard to do. It’s like someone is blasting it outside your window at 5 AM. Or like a billboard outside your front door that you can’t help but see every time you step outside. Bummer.

Fortunately, AEI’s wonderful Yuval Levin joins us today to talk about the remedy to the plight of election season and America’s recent malaise (not to echo Jimmy Carter…): the American constitution. Now, I know, you might be rolling your eyes and thinking “Those classical liberals are at it again, always talking about the founding…” But seriously. Remembering and embracing the spirit upon which America was founded—one of intellectual and political dynamism—is key to striking the balance between life, politics, and disagreement that has felt so off-kilter recently.

Levin is the director of Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies at AEI, as well as the founder and editor of National Affairs. He recently released the book American Covenant, which we are talking about today. Join us today for a livelier, timelier version of what you learned in your 7th-grade civics class.

Want to explore more?

• How the Constitution Can Bring us Together, an EconTalk podcast with Yuval Levin.
• Yuval Levin on a Time to Build, an EconTalk podcast.
• Darren Staloff on the American Founding, a Great Antidote podcast.
• Christy Lynn Horpedahl, A Skeptic's Guide to the Perfect Commonwealth, at Speaking of Smith.
• Understanding Jefferson: Slavery, Race, and the Declaration of Independence, a Liberty Matters Forum at the Online Library of Liberty.

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Growth is essential to human life. Always has been, always will be. From the moment we are born, we grow, and we continue to throughout our lives, whether that is physically, mentally, or otherwise. Societies grow too.

But what is growth? Real growth is replicable, durable, and sustainable (and not in the sense that immediately comes to mind). Your seven-year-old doesn’t shrink back down after she grows an inch. It might happen when she’s ninety, but that’s gravity (and don’t you think she’s had a good run at this point? We should accept that it’s ok to have a growth recession every now and again). So how have intellectuals conceptualized the growth of societies, environments, and economies over time? And how should we think about growth?

The wonderful Henry C. Clark joins us on the podcast today to answer these questions and more. He is the program director of the Political Economy Project at Dartmouth College and the author of several books including the newly released The Moral Economy We Have Lost: Life Before Mass Abundance. Go check it out!


Want to explore more?

• Henry Clark on the Enlightenments, a Great Antidote podcast.
• Pierre Desrochers, From Prometheus to Arcadia: Liberals, Conservatives, the Environment, and Cultural Cognition, at Econlib.
• Robert Pindyck on Averting and Adapting to Climate Change, an EconTalk podcast.
• Sandra Peart and David Levy, Happiness and the Vanity of the Philosopher: Part1, at Econlib.
• Deirdre McCloskey and Economists' Ideas About Ideas, a Liberty Matters forum at the Online Library of Liberty.

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