Thomas Sowell’s Maverick Insights on Race, Economics, and Society

“I was still a Marxist after taking Milton Friedman’s course [at the University of Chicago],” says free market economist and social critic Thomas Sowell. “One summer in the government was enough to let me say government is really not the answer.”

Known for provocative and best-selling books such as Knowledge and Decisions, A Conflict of Visions, and last year’s Charter Schools and Their Enemies, the internationally renowned scholar is the subject of a new documentary and biography, both authored by Jason L. Riley, a Manhattan Institute senior fellow and Wall Street Journal columnist. Beyond the breadth and depth of his interests, what sets Sowell apart is that he “puts truth above popularity and doesn’t concern himself with being politically correct,” Riley tells Reason‘s Nick Gillespie. “It’s an adherence to empiricism, to facts and logic and putting that ahead of theory. [Sowell] is much more interested in how an ide