Antony Fisher

Antony Fisher (1915-1988) was a member of the Mont Pelerin Society and the founder of the libertarian think tank, the Institute of Economic Affairs.

Brian Wheeler writes about Fisher's founding of the Institute for BBC Online:

It may be the dominant political force of our times, but the economic creed that came to be known as Thatcherism was born in obscure circumstances. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, politics was dominated by a single philosophy. Central planning and state control of industry was seen by both Labour and Conservatives as the only sensible way to run Britain's economy... It fell to outsiders such as Antony Fisher - an Old Etonian chicken farmer - to challenge the prevailing orthodoxy; even if, initially, they were written off as cranks or dangerous ideologues. Fisher, who made his fortune by pioneering battery farming techniques, founded a think tank, The Institute of Economic Affairs, in the mid 1950s to spread his free market philosophy.

Affiliations

• Mont Pelerin Society
• Institute of Economic Affairs
• Manhattan Institute

Connections

• Linda Whetstone, daughter.

Resources

Paul Labarique The Manhattan Institute, Neoconservatives’s Lab, Voltaire Net, 15 September 2004. Fisher speaks from the grave.