Today, Hoover announces two public contests celebrating the scholarly contributions and multigenerational impact of Thomas Sowell; Rishi Sunak calls on democratic market states to form technological, trade, and defense deals to bolster collective resilience in the face of a new authoritarian axis; and Condoleezza Rice discusses the relationship between America’s universities and technology sector, arguing that reforms to the former must be carefully calibrated to avoid disrupting the nation’s innovation edge.
Honoring Thomas Sowell
The Hoover Institution is excited to announce an essay contest and multimedia creator competition designed to honor the remarkable scholarship of Thomas Sowell, Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy. Recognized globally for his contributions to economics, social theory, and public policy across six decades, Thomas Sowell continues to inspire and influence scholars and thinkers through his work. To celebrate his invaluable legacy, the Hoover Institution invites creators to participate in a multimedia competition and students to enter an essay contest, both focused on elevating the ideas and teachings of Thomas Sowell. Participants in the creator competition are asked to submit a compelling video that addresses the question: What lesson or teaching from Thomas Sowell do Americans most need to learn or remember today? The essay contest invites participants to explore an important cultural or public policy issue through the lens of Thomas Sowell’s work. Both contests feature a prize of $5,000, plus an invitation to an upcoming celebration of Sowell at Hoover, and close at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time on August 31, 2025. Learn more here.
American and Allied Foreign Policy
“The next decade will be one of the most dangerous yet most transformational periods the world has ever seen,” warns former British Prime Minister and current Distinguished Visiting Fellow Rishi Sunak in a guest opinion column at The Wall Street Journal. To address the shared threat of an authoritarian axis seeking to reshape the global order to its advantage, Sunak argues that democratic market states must band together and deepen “economic, security, and technology cooperation.” Outlining a strategy that spans shipbuilding, free trade frameworks, and AI development, Sunak says capitalist democracies have the collective capability to “outcompete every potential rival coalition and deliver decades of astonishing economic and technological progress.” Failure to cooperate effectively and soon, says Sunak, risks allowing a world “where might makes right, where technology bolsters authoritarianism and curtails individual liberty, and where trade is a weapon of coercion.” Read more here. [Subscription required]
US Technology Policy
Hoover Institution Director Condoleezza Rice joined the Big Technology podcast to discuss whether the United States can hold its technological edge as China races ahead in AI, batteries, and advanced manufacturing. Rice shares her candid assessments of America’s tech arms race with China, the ripple effects of chip export controls, and why she believes democracies are safer stewards of frontier technologies than authoritarian states. Rice and host Alex Kantrowitz also discuss the squeeze on university research funding, immigration-driven talent pipelines, and tuition-fueled class divides. This timely conversation offers a data-rich, no-fluff analysis of the US tech industry and the risks it faces in our current political environment. In the episode, Rice emphasizes the work of Hoover’s Technology Policy Accelerator, a research initiative dedicated to mitigating risks and seizing opportunities associated with emerging technologies. Watch here.
Answering Challenges to Advanced Economies
Writing for his blog The Grumpy Economist, Senior Fellow John Cochrane dives into the current debate surrounding Medicaid work requirements. As Cochrane explains, Medicaid provides free health insurance to those who earn less than an upper income limit. The problem with this approach, in Cochrane’s view, is that those “near this limit have a big disincentive not to work more, harder, study, take a better job, move, etc., if that would cause them to exceed the income limit.” After considering the challenges that simply eliminating or phasing out the income cutoff would have, Cochrane turns to what he sees as a better solution: work requirements. “The ‘incentive’ of the work requirement formula does something to offset the disincentive of the (necessarily) income-capped benefits,” says Cochrane, even as he notes such requirements offer “an imperfect fix.” Cochrane concludes by noting that Medicaid is not the only game in town for low-cost insurance, and that states “can raise taxes and pay for insurance too.” Read more here.
Revitalizing American Institutions
In an interview with Hoover’s Chris Herhalt, Senior Fellow Paul E. Peterson shares insights from his research into the present-day operation of federalism, or the division of power and responsibilities among local, state, and federal governments. Outside of contributions to special and compensatory education, Peterson notes that the federal government’s role in education funding is “very small” compared to states and localities. Peterson also explains his general view that American federalism has yielded an “incredibly stable form of government.” Looking at the recent One Big Beautiful Bill Act, Peterson emphasizes its continuities with past budgets, saying, “there’s hardly a massive change on either the tax or the expenditure side.” The interview concludes with a discussion of federalism’s role in the COVID-19 pandemic response, particularly in the realm of education. Peterson argues that in allowing policy experimentation across states and regions, “the federal system saved us from our fantasies . . . We are now learning from the many different decisions that were made.” Read more here.
Leadership and Resilience
Join Fernando “Nando” Parrado, businessman, author, and internationally recognized speaker, and Hoover Senior Fellow H.R. McMaster as they discuss endurance, crisis leadership, and the remarkable will to survive. Surviving one of the most harrowing events of the twentieth century: the 1972 crash of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, tragically losing his mother, sister, and many rugby teammates, Parrado reflects on how the values and work ethic his family engrained in him, which was nurtured on the rugby pitch, helped build the resilience needed to withstand 72 days in extreme conditions and lead a mission across the Andes to save the remaining survivors. Author of international best seller Miracle in the Andes, Parrado describes why he chose to publish the book 36 years after the ordeal, how he went on to create a second life after the trauma, why rugby instills life lessons like no other sport in the world, and his inspiring advice for young people today. Watch or listen here.
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