I have critiqued the Ayn Rand Institute’s failures to advance Ayn Rand and promote her philosophy. Several people have asked me what I think ARI could do to succeed. I’ll provide some thoughts on that below. But first, some context.
Yaron Brook, on his podcast, publicly asked: “While [Carl Barney] was on the Board [of ARI] for 25 years when these failures were happening, what did he do about it?” He goes on a diatribe about my article, ARI is Failing and Needs Our Help. Yaron says it is “filled with misrepresentations, inaccuracies, distortions, perversions, and on and on and on I could go, but what for, what would be the purpose?” He asserts that my comments are full of errors but he refuses to specify even one. That’s telling. But it’s not my focus here. And I’m not interested in trading barbs with him. (That said, if he continues making such wild assertions, I’ll be inclined to publish the relevant documentation so that you can see for yourself.)
My concern here is to address Yaron’s claim that in my 25 years on ARI’s Board, I never said anything about my concerns with ARI’s lack of success. To understand my thinking on this, it will be helpful to first look briefly at ARI’s 2020 annual report, which was beautifully done—lots of nice pictures, graphs, and boasts. The problem is that it seriously lacks substance and doesn’t report on any real, measurable results. So much is missing from it.
Yaron, ARI’s Chairman and leading spokesman, is absent entirely. The annual report features large pictures and pieces on Tal Tsfany, CEO, and Onkar Ghate, “Chief Philosophy Officer,” but no Yaron. I’ve never seen an annual report in which the Chairman has nothing to say.
Next, given that this is the Ayn Rand Institute, you would expect to see Ayn Rand promoted, but she is presented only after a long, nine-page interview with Tal and not until halfway through the report. That is a huge problem (more on this later).
A mention of Leonard Peikoff appears almost as an afterthought in the back of the report. That’s wrong, too.
Then there is the question of transparency. Where are the measurements of ARI’s success? And what is even being measured? Where is the data showing meaningful results (not clicks, views, or hours)? Anyone who cares about advancing Rand’s ideas, and anyone giving money to ARI, should demand accurate, meaningful, rational measurements and data. The report offers little in this regard.
New Objectivists? Where are the numbers regarding increases or decreases in the number of Objectivists? There’s no measurement of that, and no indication or evidence that there are any more Objectivists now than there were 5, 10, or 20 years ago. (Yaron: Please prove me wrong!)
New Intellectuals? There are no new professional intellectuals coming out of ARI, and none getting into major universities. Greg Salmieri is the most recent, and he graduated from the Objectivist Academic Center (OAC) over 15 years ago. Alex Epstein also graduated from the OAC over 15 years ago; he is a credible voice for reason and Objectivism, but he succeeded on his own merit outside of ARI. (Yaron: Am I overlooking successful, impactful new Objectivist intellectuals from ARI?)
Book Sales? What’s happening with Ayn Rand’s and Leonard Peikoff’s books? How many books have been sold (not given away)? ARI’s annual report provides no stats on book sales whatsoever. There’s a good reason for that: the book sales have been down and declining in the U.S. for years. That is deeply troubling, and it’s an indicator of massive failure. Podcasts and radio shows may help, but if people do not read Ayn Rand and Leonard Peikoff, they will never understand or appreciate Objectivism.
Objectivist Academic Center? Where are the OAC graduates? Where is the group picture of graduates for this year?… Past years? Of course, the government-ordered lockdowns blocked the possibility of an in-person photo, but why no Zoom picture? There is no picture because there is no one to photograph—few, if any, have graduated. This is extremely sad and troubling.
OCON? Attendance at the Institute’s summer conference is perhaps ARI’s most visible failure. I’ve attended OCON for over 30 years, and the attendance has remained more or less flat for that entire time. Attendance should be in the thousands, not hundreds. In my view, it should be 10,000 by now.
ARI’s Board needs to speak to Yaron. He ran his December 31, 2020 personal radio show out of the Ayn Rand Institute’s Conference Room but told his listeners to ignore that fact. He asserted that he’s not speaking for ARI, and he’s not discussing Objectivism, only his own ideas. Yet he’s the foremost spokesman for ARI, the current Chairman of the Board, and the former CEO of about 15 years. Yaron used the power and prestige of his position to lend credibility to his show and to raise money for himself—a sort of telethon. In doing so, he has endangered ARI’s nonprofit status with the IRS.
Yaron wants to get paid for his show, but despite my urging of many years, he refuses to charge for Leonard Peikoff’s courses, which are invaluable. Not charging for Leonard’s and Ayn Rand’s works devalues and debases them. I know from comments I’ve received that many people are offended by the $0 price tag on material that is among the most valuable in all of human history. When I look at ARI’s treatment of Leonard’s courses, in particular, I see lack of respect.
So, what can be done? First, and above all, this is the Ayn Rand Institute—repeat, Ayn Rand! It should not be about Yaron Brook, or Onkar Ghate, or Tal Tsfany. All of Leonard Peikoff’s lectures at the Ford Hall Forum and all his courses were directly related to Ayn Rand and her philosophy of Objectivism. His brilliant exposition of Ayn Rand and Objectivism did not detract from his eminence; it enhanced it. Leonard has always been his own man, while being a devoted advocate of Ayn Rand and teacher of Objectivism.
ARI should be doing much more to promote Ayn Rand and her brilliant philosophy. Massive promotions should be done of her novels, her nonfiction books, and the courses that she and Leonard taught. There should be book clubs and study clubs centered around their books and materials.
No one teaches Ayn Rand and Objectivism as well as Leonard. All of his courses should be marketed vigorously, delivered professionally, and priced appropriately. They should not be thrown up on YouTube for free alongside kitten and puppy videos. They should be offered as premium courses and taught worldwide, as was agreed many years ago when I proposed, planned, and financed ARI Campus.
There is so much more that ARI could and should be doing to advance Objectivism.
Now, for an indication of what I did and said about such things while I was on the Board of ARI.
In 2014-2015, at Yaron’s request, I created a detailed agenda, the most relevant parts of which I’ve uploaded here, here, and here. This is an extract from the introduction:
ARI STRATEGIC PLANNING 2015
Agenda Questions: As for me, I’m not interested in a routine confirmation and tweak planning sessions, i.e., we do more or less of what we are already doing. Yaron wrote on 7/6/2015, we need “to expand current programs and bring new ones online… essential to changing the culture.” I’m not sure this is true.
I want to question everything; re-think everything; then stop or continue with minimum, moderate, or maximum effort.
What will exist in 10 or 15 years that will make a real difference? Number of Objectivist intellectuals? …of Objectivists? …of fans? …of AR books sold? …of books sold? Conferences? Speaking tours? Campus courses completed? TV appearances? Radio show? Policy briefings? Books on healthcare, education, equality? What numbers of what do we want to exist in 10-15 years?
Above all, I want to set a clear, aggressive, specific goal(s) that will lead to a substantive, measurable result—100,000 students active on Campus? 15,000 Objectivists? 1,000 professors teaching Objectivism?
Really, the question is: What will be the BIG result by 2025/2030?—a clear, specific, measurable, significant, BIG GOAL(S), and a clear-cut means of achieving it/them.
Also, at the end, real commitment to the plan, even, hopefully, excitement.
Yaron and I, along with other ARI executives and some Board members, spent seven full days planning to significantly improve ARI, which I was already funding substantially and interested in funding even more substantially. I asked many questions to spark discussion and generate ideas. And many excellent ideas were considered. However, at the end of the planning, Yaron declared that he wasn’t going to change anything. All of the planning that had been done over the previous seven days was rejected and abandoned. I was stunned and profoundly disappointed.
I left and went home. A few days later, Yaron flew to my home at Lake Tahoe and made promises to implement some of the ideas planned, and in particular, to promote and deliver Leonard’s courses according to my requests. He didn’t keep his promises.
Yaron had mainly planned to create a cadre of professional Objectivists at ARI who would write books and lecture around the world. Tens of millions of dollars have now been spent on this program. What is the result? Some books were published, but few if any of them sold more than 1,000 copies. There are no new renowned Objectivist speakers. Yaron’s plan hasn’t worked. If it had, and if ARI were successful, I would be cheering rather than critiquing.
Some are concerned about my critiquing ARI, yet if we are to have a real and effective Ayn Rand Institute—one that actually carries out the mission of promoting Ayn Rand and advancing her ideas—then we must speak up, particularly major contributors and Board members. Speaking up makes a difference. We can see this in my case; some of my prior posts have noticeably affected ARI. You can see a bit more focus on Rand, and more (but still inadequate) promotion of Leonard Peikoff and his books and courses.
We need a strong, effective ARI that produces measurable results. I’ve written several posts that have produced some changes, but I’m hoping that this will be my last one on this topic. I want to focus on Prometheus Foundation and on finishing my book.
I’ve spoken up. I’ve communicated some painful things that needed to be said. Now, I encourage contributors and the Board to speak up. Asking tough questions, such as those in the agenda I wrote, would be a starting point. Ask for measurable results. Demand them.
My best to you and ARI.
Mr. Barney asks how can ARI be saved. Until he broached the question, I wasn’t aware that it needed saving. Before reading the blog post, I thought perhaps he was about to report on a coming financial failure. Rather, the chief concern is about setting a meaningful long-term goal and to a lesser extent, measures of success that clearly point to progress toward meeting that goal.
This response to Mr. Barney’s post will make a case for ARI to establish and nurture local, affiliated organizations.
ARI’s mission statement seems clear enough on the surface: ARI “fosters a growing awareness, understanding and acceptance of Ayn Rand’s philosophy…” The ARI 2020 Annual Report discloses the growing amount of online content, increasing subscribers and attendance at conferences. The impact of most of this seems to be at the “awareness” level. Undoubtedly, it is harder to measure success at the “understanding” and “acceptance” levels.
Mr. Barney states he wants ARI to “set clear, aggressive, specific goal(s)” and that they “will lead to a substantive, measurable result…” There are two issues here. One is the goal itself. Is the current goal – the mission statement – too abstract? If so, it does not lend itself to meaningful measures of success.
The broader question is what is the best way to advance Ayn Rand and promote her philosophy. This is not merely a worthy goal, but a necessary one for those who want to live in a society proper for the flourishing of mankind. Mr. Barney has pointed out the many things that ARI has done over the years and finds them lacking as a means to that goal.
The projects and approaches in which ARI are engaged are similar in one crucial aspect to the way other Objectivist organizations (e.g. The Atlas Society and The Objective Standard Institute) have attacked the goal – it is top-down. By that, I mean that the programs largely engage individuals with self-learning programs, lectures and exercises. Just look at all the content available from these institutions: lectures, debates, engaging, informative and even entertaining videos, animated stories, etc. It’s a long and, indeed, impressive list.
There is nothing wrong with self-learning, and to be sure, there are significant advantages to it, but there is a huge portion of the population that just won’t get it that way. Face-to-face learning comes along with face-to-face communication and that brings with it a host of other values such as allowing discussion where the learner actively participates and building connections (not just personal, but philosophic and business). The list is huge and this forum is probably not the place to put forth a treatise on the subject. The point is that people – even Objectivists – need and benefit from personal interaction.
But, you might argue, all these organizations do engage in face-to-face events. There are annual conferences, student training sessions, lecture tours, etc. But these all have one thing in common. When the event is over, everybody goes home.
I will put forth the proposition that what is needed to advance Ayn Rand and promote her philosophy are local organizations. Unlike other local organization or chapters of a larger national organization, a local Objectivist organization has, at its core, a uniquely strong bond that can only come from a deep-seated understanding and commitment to a life-enhancing philosophy. As powerful as that is, it is necessary, but not sufficient to sustain and grow the enterprise. It must also provide a venue and programs where participants can engage in other activities that, in and of themselves, are capable of forming bonds among participants. This is also a huge list and could include things like education (different programs and syllabi for different ages), entertainment, music, business connections, and community projects. But mostly, it provides face-to-face interactions that are a necessary ingredient in a recipe for human flourishing. A local organization affiliated with ARI also provides a built-in measure of progress – growth of membership.
What then would be the role of the national organization? In addition to continuing the educational programs as they now do, they would also build and support local organizations. A key part of that is training educational/philosophic instructors to lead the local organization. ARI’s OAC graduates would be a perfect source of these leaders. What do most AOC graduates do now? I would guess they go home and continue their self-study activities. Having an occupational path – being employed as a teacher/leader at a local chapter – open to them that make full use of their new-found knowledge would be a significant incentive to continue their quest for knowledge.
Are there downsides to a national Objectivist organization taking on such a role? Certainly, not the least of which is adding an additional burden onto already limited resources devoted to education. Carrying staff whose primary objective is organizing and supporting local chapters requires a set of skills largely unrelated to the content of the educational mission. Another potential downside is that, to some degree, the national organization risks losing control of the message. As local groups grow, there exists the very real possibility that lines of thought not wholly consistent with the national organization’s understanding of Objectivism will begin to emerge.
This is a very sketchy outline for an Objectivist growth strategy that is substantially different from the approaches being used now. This outline is already much longer than is appropriate for a reply on a blog site, and I sincerely appreciate Mr. Barney’s making such a forum available. Thank you. I hope this leads to further thought and discussion on the subject.
John Ridpath, a giant in the Objectivist movement, passed this week. As I searched the internet for his work, I had great difficulty finding much. How unfortunate! Why wasn’t Dr. Ridpath and others like him at the forefront of this movement? Why is there only one debate with both Drs. Peikoff and Ridpath?
It is challenging to change a culture, however, I can not pretend to understand ARI’s strategy over all these years. In my opinion, it has not been working, and I hope this new CEO can invigorate the organization with specific objectives and a clear strategy to meet them.
The good news is that there are new voices and other platforms resurrecting a number of the forgotten Masters of Objectivism. I hope to see ARI interacting with them under the the principle unite and rule.
Personally, I think it’s best not to charge for the app. The more we can get Ayn Rand’s ideas out into the culture the more we can persuade even the disinterested.
Carl, I must say that I am very impressed with your critique. I have been disappointed with the lack of progress of ARI. I recommend the board pick at least two of your ideas and spend the time and money to implement them
A good way to get ideas for the successful spread of ideas is to learn from movements of the past and present.
Ed, you said that “the Mises Institute
…has been much more successful on any metric than ARI at about 1/3 the annual budget.” Do you have any more details on what the two think tanks do differently, and, importantly, what ‘metrics’ and ways of quantifying success to use in each case?
[Two points of comparison to consider:
(I) The likely greater difficulty for an Objectivist philosopher to get tenure compared to a free-market economist.
(II) Is Mises spending money comparably on long-range or slow payoff projects, like ARI’s books for students or the essay contests or a multi-year academic training center?
–Phil C
In a world where the Objectivist movement is fighting a tremendously uphill battle against the culture and is doing so with limited resources compared to the powerful entrenched institutions, it’s natural that there will be disagreements about strategies, tactics, priorities, where to ‘place the most chips’.
I would hope that Carl’s foundation, ARI, Craig Bissell’s operation, Jennifer Grossman’s and any others trying to spread the ideas can compete (while sometimes also giving each other a boost) and let the results speak for themselves, and attract deserved support.
To some extent to attract people to your operation, you have to argue for its superiority as an investment of time and resources over other alternatives which can mean being critical of the emphases of other Objectivist groups.
But I would like to see a world where these things don’t turn out to be an airing of personal criticisms or disputes beyond that.
I understand the temptation not to ‘turn the other cheek’ and keep correcting the record when someone attacks you personally or has a different interpretation of what was said or happened, but hope that that could be avoided as much as possible: Not escalate*.
During the 60-year history of the Objectivist movement, my observation is that every time this has happened, people end up taking sides and focusing too much on that rather than on fighting for the ideas themselves and end up exhausted and disillusioned with the movement as a whole. (This has particularly an impact on the young – the fuel for the renewal of any movement … those who are new to the ideas and idealistic and just learning them and looking for role models among the leading advocates who can relate to each other in the luminous way the inhabitants of Galt’s Gulch did.)
A hostile public culture and media is just rubbing its hands and quick to paint the movement adversely because of these kinds of public altercations.
For both these reasons, in each case in the past, the whole movement has shrunk or lost some idealism, forward momentum, benevolence of interactions among its proponents, “gone on defense” publicly… and so on.
–Phil C.
*An example of a bystander casualty of one of these conflicts is George Reisman, an Objectivist economist who has written arguably the definitive book explaining and defending laissez-faire which has been praised by ~multiple Nobel laureates~ in economics. Because of his ostracism, the opportunity has been missed by Objectivist intellectuals to use dozens of his brilliant quotes and passages when economic issues come up. And to recruit him as a teacher/mentor for new generations of Objectivist intellectuals. (He was ostracized, it seems, not because of anything relating to him or his commitment to Objectivism, but because of a dispute with his wife.)
Another excellent critique, Mr. Barney. I am of two minds about charging for courses and lectures. On the one hand, I remember the outrageous prices that used to be charged for the taped lecture courses in the past that made them unaffordable for me as a struggling student, so I collected most of them second-hand from friends or eventually on Ebay. The prices now seem quite low in comparison. And while I agree that Dr. Peikoff’s courses are extremely valuable, every creator is competing for ever consumer’s ear, and with thousands of free podcasts and YouTube courses on every subject imaginable, not to mention Audible audiobooks and Great Courses courses for $10 each, the ability to charge large prices for any audio course or book is quite limited. For example, Atlas Shrugged is available on Audible for free to anyone, like myself, who has an Audible Plus membership. That’s a price that’s hard to beat when it comes to Objectivist content!
On the other hand, there are the libertarians like the Mises Institute, founded for the explicit purpose of spreading the ideas of Ludwig van Mises and Murray Rothbard as much as possible, which has been much more successful on any metric than ARI at about 1/3 the annual budget. Mises has put every single thing written by Mises and Rothbard over their entire lives on the Mises website for free in PDF or ebook form, while continuing to sell hardback and paperback versions for those who want them. Thus any person who wishes either to dip their toe into libertarian thought or consume Human Action in its entirety can do so for free. This is a serious advantage that Mises has over ARI, since one really has to hook people on philosophy when they are young (and thus poor). Sure, *now* I can afford a leather-bound edition of all of Ayn Rand’s books, but when I started into Objectivism, I was a very poor grad student.
One thing I always wondered (and in fact asked ARI about 15 years ago) is why the entire ARI catalogue isn’t made available for purchase (and discovery through search) on Amazon at whatever price you choose? Surely this is the easiest and most cost-effective way to promote Dr. Peikoff’s material (and the material of other original generation Objectivist thinkers) without doing a whole lot of work. “That’s a good idea!” I was told at the time. Fifteen years later, it is still not done.
Thanks again for your efforts.
“refuses to charge for Leonard Peikoff’s courses, which are invaluable”
You’ve got a point here, but you don’t say why Leonard acquiesces to this?
Good question my understanding is he owns the rights to his work and Ayn Rands work?