Fundamentals
Conscientious Objection: What It Is, When It Applies, and Its Limits
Conscientious objection protects a person's moral integrity, but it is not a blanket permission to ignore any duty.
Publication contributor
Articles by Daniel Sardá · Page 16
This archive contains published site articles attributed to Daniel Sardá. The separate Thinkers section contains historical intellectual profiles, not publication contributors.
Fundamentals
Barriers to Entry: What They Are and How They Affect Competition
Barriers to entry make it harder for new competitors to enter a market; some are legitimate, while others turn rules into privileges.
Fundamentals
Liberal Tolerance: What It Means and Why It Protects Freedom
Liberal tolerance lets people live with real disagreement without turning moral or political disapproval into coercion against peaceful persons.
Fundamentals
Liberal Republicanism: What It Is and How It Protects Freedom
Liberal republicanism combines individual rights and republican institutions to prevent arbitrary domination by power.
Fundamentals
What supply and demand are and why they explain prices
Supply and demand explain how buyers and sellers coordinate decisions through prices, scarcity, costs, preferences and incentives.
Fundamentals
What economic protectionism is and what its effects are
Economic protectionism seeks to shield domestic producers from foreign competition, but its costs often fall on consumers, taxpayers, competitors and firms that rely on imported inputs.
Fundamentals
What an Open Society Is and Why It Matters for Freedom
An open society allows different people to coexist, dissent, cooperate and criticize power under general rules, rights and limited institutions.
Fundamentals
What Liberal Constitutionalism Is and How It Limits Power
Liberal constitutionalism is not merely having a written Constitution: it requires effective limits on power through rights, higher rules and real checks.
Fundamentals
What free prices are and why they transmit economic information
Free prices are not just numbers: they are signals that communicate scarcity, preferences, costs, risks and opportunities to coordinate millions of decisions.
Fundamentals
State Coercion: What It Is and Why It Concerns Classical Liberalism
State coercion is the legal capacity of the state to compel, prohibit, sanction, tax, inspect or use public force under rules that must be limited.
Fundamentals
What Separation of Powers Is and Why It Protects Freedom
Separation of powers distributes public functions among different organs so that no single authority can make the law, execute it and judge its own abuses.
Fundamentals
Limited Government vs Minimal State: Differences, Points of Contact and Limits on Power
Limited government controls power through rules, rights and institutions; the minimal state reduces government to basic functions such as security, justice and defense.
Fundamentals
Individual Sovereignty: What It Is and How It Relates to Liberty
Individual sovereignty affirms that the person does not belong to the state, the party, the majority or the collective: each person has conscience, agency, rights and responsibility.
Fundamentals
What Spontaneous Order Is and Why It Matters for Understanding Markets and Society
Spontaneous order shows how language, money, prices, norms and markets can coordinate human actions without a complete central design.
Fundamentals
Political Liberalism vs Economic Liberalism: Differences and Connections
Political liberalism protects rights and limits on power; economic liberalism protects property, contracts, markets and freedom of enterprise.
Fundamentals
Why Political Power Must Have Limits
Political power must be limited because it can impose legal coercion. Without rules, checks and rights, it turns liberties into revocable permissions.
Fundamentals
Individual Rights vs Collective Rights: Differences, Risks and Limits
Individual rights protect concrete persons; collective rights invoke groups, communities, peoples or identities and require clear limits.
Fundamentals
Individual Liberty: What It Is and Why It Is Central to Classical Liberalism
Individual liberty protects each person’s life, conscience, speech, property, association and life projects against arbitrary power.
Fundamentals
What Equality Before the Law Is and Why It Is Essential for a Free Society
Equality before the law requires general rules applicable to everyone: no one above the law, no one beneath its protection and no political privilege.
Fundamentals
What the Free Market Is and Why It Does Not Mean Absence of Rules
The free market is not chaos or corporate privilege: it is voluntary exchange under private property, contracts, competition, responsibility and general rules.
Fundamentals
What Economic Competition Is and Why It Protects Consumers
Economic competition protects consumers because it forces companies to earn their preference through better prices, quality, variety, innovation and service.
Fundamentals
Negative Liberty vs Positive Liberty: What the Difference Is and Why It Matters
Negative liberty protects against arbitrary interference; positive liberty asks whether a person has real capacity to pursue their ends.
Fundamentals
What Limited Government Is and Why It Matters for Freedom
Limited government is not absence of government: it is political power subject to rules, competences, rights, institutional checks and constitutional limits.
Fundamentals
Classical Liberalism vs Neoliberalism: Conceptual, Historical and Political Differences
Classical liberalism and neoliberalism are not the same: one is a tradition of limits on power; the other is a later, disputed and often political term.