School and University Visits

Adam Smith Institute staff are all experienced and engaging speakers, and we can between us give talks on a wide range of topics based on our individual research and expertise. We are almost always happy to send someone to give a lecture on one of our specialist topics at universities and schools across the country—or speak on a panel or in a debate.

We are also very happy to arrange lectures and talks via Zoom or similar platforms.

Here, as an example, is a talk our former Executive Director Sam Bowman gave in Edinburgh on ‘The Free Market Road to Social Justice’, and here is one he gave on ‘The State of the Minimum Wage Debate’. Below you find a list of the ASI staff and the areas they talk about.

To arrange a visit, please email the Institute’s Director of Research, Maxwell Marlow, at maxwell@adamsmith.org

President, Dr Madsen Pirie

Dr Madsen Pirie is President of the Adam Smith Institute, and was one of three Scots graduates working in the US who founded the Institute in 1977. Before that, Madsen worked for the House of Representatives in Washington DC, and was Distinguished Visiting Professor Philosophy at Hillsdale College in Michigan.

A graduate of the universities of Edinburgh, St Andrews and Cambridge, Madsen has authored several books including The Book of the Fallacy, Micropolitics, Privatization, How to Win Every Argument, 101 Great Philosophers, Blueprint for a Revolution, and Freedom 101. He also writes children’s science fiction, and with his colleague Dr Eamonn Butler he has co- authored a series of books on IQ, including The Sherlock Holmes IQ Book.

Dr Pirie is happy to give lectures on:

  • Things Politicians and Economists Often Get Wrong

  • Economics in Two Lessons

  • 10 Radical Steps to Improve the World

  • Looking at the World Through Neoliberal Eyes

  • Common Logical Fallacies

Director, Dr Eamonn Butler

Eamonn Butler is Director of the Adam Smith Institute, rated one of the world’s leading policy think-tanks. He has degrees in economics, philosophy and psychology, gaining a PhD from the University of St Andrews in 1978.

During the 1970s he worked on pensions and welfare issues for the US House of Representatives, and taught philosophy in Hillsdale College, Michigan, before returning to the UK to help found the Adam Smith Institute.

Eamonn is author of books on the pioneering economists Milton Friedman, F A Hayek, Ludwig von Mises and Adam Smith, and co-author of Forty Centuries of Wage and Price Controls and books on intelligence testing.

Dr Butler is happy to give lectures on:

  • The Thought of Friedrich Hayek

  • The Thought of Milton Friedman

  • The Thought of Ludwig Von Mises

  • Why Care About Inequality?

  • An Introduction to the Public Choice School of Economics

Director of Research, Maxwell Marlow

Maxwell Marlow is the Director of Research at the Adam Smith Institute.

Before working at the Adam Smith Institute, he worked as a Public Affairs and Communications Executive at strategic consultancy Hanbury Strategy. He was previously Development and Research Officer for the ASI, and held a Fellowship.

Maxwell graduated with a first class Joint Hons BSc in Politics and History from the London School of Economics & Political Science, where he was also twice consecutive President of the Hayek Society. Whilst at LSE, he was a Don Lavoie Fellow in Political Economy at the Mercatus Center, George Mason University. He is a Fellow at the Consumer Choice Center.

Maxwell is happy to give lectures on:

  • The Case for Optimism in the 21st Century

  • Why Britain Can't Build

  • Britain's Economy: From WW2 to the Pandemic, How We Went From Rich to Poor

  • How Policy Works: Lessons from Westminster