Free contest, Morality of Free Enterprise Essay Contest, top prize: $1,500 (Canada)

Deadline: 15 June 2011

The Institute for Liberal Studies invites students to submit essays on the subject of the morality of free enterprise. The following prizes will be awarded:

1st - $1,500 plus a trip to the Atlas Liberty Forum in Washington, DC.

2nd - $750 plus a trip to the Atlas Liberty Forum in Washington, DC.

Honourable Mention - three additional contestants will be awarded a cash prize of $250.

This contest is part of the Atlas Economic Research Foundation's Morality of Free Enterprise project. We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Donner Canadian Foundation for their support.

Eligibility: Contestants must expect to be enrolled at a Canadian post-secondary institution for the fall semester or have graduated from a Canadian post-secondary institution in the past six months. Canadians who expect to be enrolled at a foreign post-secondary institution in the fall or have graduated from a foreign institution within the last six months are also eligible to enter.

Format: Essays should not exceed 1,200 words and must include a bibliography and citations using a widely recognized academic style (e.g. APA, MLA, Chicago). Entries must be submitted electronically in .doc, .docx, or .pdf format.

Deadline: Entries must be received by 11:59PM ET on June 15, 2011.

Questions: Any questions should be addressed to Matt Bufton via the Contact Us page on this website.

Sources: Contestants are encouraged to review a variety of resources in order to compose a high-quality essay. The following sources may be helpful.

* Does the free market corrode moral character?, John Templeton Foundation

* The Humanitarian with a Guillotine, Isabel Paterson

* For-Profit Medicine and the Compassion Motive, Tom Palmer

* The Market Economy and the Distribution of Wealth, Ludwig Lachmann

* Why the Market? Markets as social and moral spaces, Virgil Henry Storr

* Philanthropy, Markets and Commercial Society: Beyond the Hayekian Impasse, Robert F. Garnett Jr.

* Assurance and Trust in a Great Society, Daniel B. Klein

* Business and Morality in a Free Society, Edward W. Youkins

* The "Invisible Hand", Journal of Business Ethics Vol. 46 No. 3 September 2003, Jan Narveson (available through JSTOR)

Submit here.