The New Fusionism We Need
Almost 60 years ago, Frank Meyer formulated “fusionism.” He explained why 1950s anti-communists, free-market proponents, and social conservatives could unite in a coherent coalition.
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From Protecting Essential Workers to Upgrading Essential Industries
The COVID-19 panic has drawn long-overdue attention to the economic and health and financial challenges facing many “essential workers” including nurses and health aides, nursing home aides, slaughterhouse workers, truckers, grocery store clerks and other retail workers, warehouse workers, and others upon whom the daily functioning of our continental society depends.
Thinking Big to Act Small
American Compass proposes that conservatives revisit the question of whether a nation can afford an economic order without a “compass,” a guide that can provide a sense of direction national policy and shared intention. The question is essential, and the answers on offer on this site portend a new course for the American political order.
Special Episode of The Editors: Rich Lowry and Oren Cass
Rich Lowry interviews Oren Cass about the launch of American Compass.
A Note of Introduction
Welcome to American Compass. Our mission is to restore an economic consensus that emphasizes the importance of family, community, and industry to the nation’s liberty and prosperity.
Seven Questions for Oren Cass on the New Conservatism
TAC’s Jordan Bloom interviews Oren Cass about the launch of American Compass and the future of American conservatism.
Rebooting the American System
The comprehensive, conservative case for a return to robust national economic policy
Planning for When the Market Cannot
The fact that government planners are not omniscient is obvious, but it does not automatically follow that planning is always ineffective. Perfect information is simply not a precondition of successful planning in either the private or the public sectors.
Foreword: On Security
The American system of innovation, combining strategic investment and private enterprise, made our nation’s industry the envy of the world. It can pave the way for widespread prosperity and security again today.
Rediscovering a Genuine American System
Economic stability, national security, widely shared prosperity, strong families, a pluralistic society—in short, the American way of life—are achievements plainly worth conserving. So is the only approach to economic policy that has ever proved capable of producing them.
Foreword: On Resilience
America’s ability to meet the challenges of tomorrow rests on our conviction to turn a new economic page today.
Removing the Blinders From Economic Policy
Remove the blinders of economic fundamentalism, and it is impossible not to see the social, legal, historical, and institutional scaffolding that buttresses a growing economy, and the role that public policy must play in its construction and maintenance.
Conservatism in the Crisis
THE ECONOMIST—With delightful British spelling, The Economist reports on American Compass: “an impressive organisation” of the “dissident faction … led by some of the most interesting conservative thinkers” that rejects “market fundamentalism.”
Coronavirus Means the Era of Big Government Is…Back
American Compass’s Oren Cass argues that “one lesson we can and should learn from all this is that you can’t just flip a switch on strong, effective government when you need it.”
Rubio Raises Profile in Pandemic, Challenges GOP Economics
Rubio’s essays and speeches on his idea of common-good capitalism draw heavily from his Catholicism and from the work of policy experts such as American Compass’s Oren Cass.
Conversation with Oren Cass
American Compass’s Oren Cass joins the Ronald Reagan Institute’s Reaganism podcast to discuss his organization’s mission to save American conservatism from what he calls its “chronic case of market fundamentalism.”
American Scream
American Compass’s Wells King reviews Michael Strain’s new book The American Dream Is Not Dead (But Populism Could Kill It).
Oren Cass Calls Out Libertarian Who Thinks Harvard Shouldn’t Pay Food Workers
American Compass’s Oren Cass talks about extraordinary measures the government needs to take in the economic crisis to generate growth and prosperity for the future.
Saving the American Economy—Why Congress Needs to Pass a Stimulus Package Immediately
American Compass’s Oren Cass joins Congressman Dan Crenshaw to discuss stimulus measures which would bring desperately needed economic relief to Americans in the age of COVID-19.
The WSJ Freaks After Domestic Policy Expert Appears on Rising
American Compass’s Oren Cass responds to the Wall Street Journal’s negative coverage of his analysis on America’s economic challenges.
