The corporate purpose of Free To Choose Network (managers of Capitaf) is “To use accessible and entertaining media to build popular support for personal, economic and political freedom thus advancing human well-being.” Capitaf gives us a facility ideally suited for creative brainstorming, scholarly debate, quiet contemplation, or intellectual collaboration. It offers an opportunity to leverage our primary activities, providing an outlet for those in whom our videos have ignited the desire to dig deeply into the winning ideas of freedom.
Our intent is to use Capitaf to perpetuate Milton Friedman’s legacy — to create a one-of-a-kind space for discussion and contemplation on the practical application of Friedman’s ideas to the many public policy issues that citizens in a free society must grapple with on a daily basis.
Other than Milton Friedman, we challenge you to think of another individual in the 20th Century who put forth as many carefully thought through proposals for the application of the economic way of thinking and classical liberal ideals to public policy issues. Few approach his influence as measured by scholars who considered him the starting point for their intellectual development.
His ideas, expressed in Capitalism and Freedom for the inquiring non-academic individual and brought to a mass audience through his TV series Free To Choose, along with the book based on the TV series, are being tested every day and will be the subject of debates and research for decades to come. They are ideas with no tie to a specific time, culture, or people. They have no tie to any particular political party. They are ideas for improving human well-being through free market capitalism.
Capitaf played a major role in the development of those ideas. It was built in part with royalties from the sale of Capitalism and Freedom, thus its name. With Baker Library at Dartmouth College just 25 minutes away, it combined solitude for careful thought with access to the resources needed for intensive research prior to the wonder of the Internet. Much of Friedman’s work on monetary theory was developed here.
The work done here by Milton and Rose changed the world and it will now become a refuge for those who are continuing that work. Capitaf is the perfect venue for sharing his ideas with those aspiring to follow his example. It’s the ideal retreat for uninterrupted scholarly exploration of those ideas.
Capitaf was the Friedmans’ private residence, an escape from the world stage and the controversies that were a constant result of his uncompromising opposition to the use of government to guide people’s lives. But it was also a center of intellectual development, with a constant stream of visitors, some sharing Milton’s perspective, some not, engaging with him and Rose in the unending effort to explain how humans can organize societies to achieve the highest possible standard of living. To the Friedmans, that goal would be achieved through the greatest possible degree of personal, political and economic freedom.
That debate continues and will confront all generations to come. What does being free to choose mean? How is it best achieved? Those and all the concomitant questions will continue to be pursued in the rooms and trails of Capitaf as groups and individuals follow in the actual steps of Milton and Rose.
That debate continues and will confront all generations to come. What does being free to choose mean? How is it best achieved? Those and all the concomitant questions that follow will continue to be pursued in the rooms and trails of Capitaf as groups and individuals follow in the actual steps of Milton and Rose.