Атлас желісі: Еркін нарық зерттеулер ұйымы

Free market American think tank support group
the United States based organization that supports think tanks

Atlas Network, formerly known as Atlas Economic Research Foundation, is a non governmental 501(c)(3) organization based in the United States that provides training, networking, and grants for libertarian, free market, and conservative groups around the world. Atlas Network was founded in 1981 by Antony Fisher, a British entrepreneur, who wanted to create a means to connect various think tanks via a global network. Described as "a think tank that creates think tanks," the organization partners with nearly 600 organizations in over 100 countries.

Atlas Network was founded in 1981 in San Francisco as the Atlas Economic Research Foundation by Antony Fisher, a British entrepreneur who was influenced by economist F. A. Hayek and his book, The Road to Serfdom. After founding the Institute of Economic Affairs in London in 1955, Fisher had helped establish the Fraser Institute, the Manhattan Institute and the Pacific Research Institute in the 1970s. Margaret Thatcher, F. A. Hayek, and Milton Friedman, all friends of Fisher, formally endorsed the organization. Initially comprising only Fisher's think tanks, Atlas Network grew to include many others, including those affiliated with the Koch family. Atlas Network has received funding from American and European businesses and think tanks to coordinate and organize libertarian organizations in the developing world. Atlas Network has been described as "self replicating, a think tank that creates think tanks." The 2019 and 2020 Global Go To Think Tank Index Report ranked Atlas Network as 54th among the "Top Think Tanks in the United States." The organization's website says it is not named after Ayn Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged, but some published sources say it is. In 1981, Atlas Network helped economist Hernando de Soto found the Institute for Liberty and Democracy (ILD) in Peru In 1983, Fisher helped launch the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA) in Dallas, Texas, Atlas Network generally refrains from taking any institutional positions on public policy subjects that its affiliates support. According to The Guardian, more than a fifth of Atlas Network affiliates worldwide had either opposed tobacco controls or taken tobacco donations. The University of Bath's Tobacco Control Research Group said Atlas Network "appears to have played a particular role in helping the tobacco industry oppose tobacco control measures in Latin America" during the 1990s. Le Monde identified 17 Atlas Network partners engaged in lobbying and advocacy for "tobacco harm reduction," which supports vaping as a substitute for smoking. An article in The New Republic blamed Atlas Network for its members' efforts in some countries to criminalize climate protesting, particularly in Germany. and its affiliates as being "partly funded by Koch and allied capitalists, with heavy support from fossil fuel based fortunes". Atlas Network was linked to an online campaign that used fake accounts against the Cuban government during the 2021 Cuban protests, according to disinformation expert Julián Macías Tovar. Tovar, cited in The Guardian, also said that Atlas Network members' Twitter accounts had been involved in bot or troll center campaigns during the 2019 Bolivian political crisis, the 2021 Ecuadorian general election, and the 2021 Peruvian general election.

The chief executive officer of Atlas Network is Brad Lips. Lips joined Atlas Network, then known as the Atlas Economic Research Foundation, in 1998 He has said he advocates for a "freedom philosophy," and quoting Friedman, has summarized Atlas Network's function as "to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive until the politically impossible becomes the politically inevitable." He has said Atlas Network is nonpartisan and "willing to talk to all parties." Matt Warner is the organization's president, while Tom G. Palmer serves as executive vice president for international programs. Warner and Palmer co authored the book Development with Dignity: Self Determination, Localization, and the End of Poverty. Palmer, known in libertarian circles since the 1970s, has promoted libertarian efforts in various countries including communist and post communist Eastern Europe, Iraq and Afghanistan; after the 2022 Russian invasion, he traveled inside Ukraine to help coordinate Atlas Network aid, which according to the Washington Examiner totaled $3.5 million by December 2022. Atlas Network worked with its partners to create the Ukraine Freedom Fund, acquiring, transporting, and providing goods to Ukrainian civilians affected by the war. Only 30 people work specifically for Atlas Network, although more than a thousand people participate in it via its partner think tanks, according to Global Think Tanks: Policy Networks and Governance, published in 2020. Entrepreneur Magatte Wade is director of the Center for African Prosperity and the historian Ibrahim B. Anoba is a fellow at the center. Wade said in Reason that the solution to Africa's economic problems lies in a "cheetah generation" of young Africans who embrace free markets, individualism, human rights, and transparency in government. In her words, "[Africa is] poor because we don't let our entrepreneurs work." Antonella Marty of Argentina served as a fellow for the Center for Latin America, which publishes the annual Index of Bureaucracy. Atlas Network also runs the Center for United States and Canada and the Center for Asia and Oceania.

Atlas Network offers training, consulting, and professional certification related to fundraising, marketing, organizational leadership, and think tank management through its Atlas Network Academy program. In 2020, Atlas Network trained nearly 4,000 people in promoting free market voices, preparing nearly 900 people to work at global think tanks. Philadelphia Magazine described Atlas Network as "supporting free market approaches to eliminating poverty and noted for its refutation of climate change and defense of the tobacco industry." Atlas Network holds four regional Liberty Forums (in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Europe) and an international conference in the United States. Llosa, a Nobel Prize winner and classical liberal, is considered a "friend" of the organization. An Atlas Network executive wrote in the New York Post that its Liberty Forums are "like an Anti Davos," offering trade show type environments for think tanks to exchange ideas. In Canada, Atlas Network partners with about a dozen think tanks. Atlas Network has partnered with the F. A. Hayek Foundation in Slovakia, the Association for Liberal Thinking in Turkey, the Lithuanian Free Market Institute, and Libertad y Desarrollo in Chile to establish Free Enterprise Training Centers. The Ukraine based Bendukidze Free Market Center is also an Atlas Network partner. Commentator Deroy Murdock, an Atlas Network senior fellow as of 2017, wrote that the organization "encourages institutions to use local knowledge to reduce government obstacles to upward mobility," featuring local entrepreneurs who overcome such obstacles. In Australia, Atlas Network has partnered with several free market think tanks, including the Centre for Independent Studies, Institute of Public Affairs, and LibertyWorks. In New Zealand, Atlas Network has partnered with the free market think tank New Zealand Taxpayers' Union. In 2020, Atlas Network provided more than $5 million in the form of grants to support its network of more than 500 partners worldwide. According to Atlas Network, its grants fund coaching, networking, pitch competitions, award programs, and other "ambitious projects for policy change."

Atlas Network’s Templeton Freedom Award, supported by Templeton Religion Trust and named after Sir John Templeton, was established in 2004. In 2015, the Acton Institute was awarded $100,000 for its documentary film “Poverty, Inc.” In 2021, India's Centre for Civil Society was the winner. In 2022, the Sri Lanka–based Advocata Institute, an Atlas Network partner, won its Asia Liberty Award and the Templeton Freedom Award. The organization's Think Tank Shark Tank competition allows professionals to pitch their projects to judges. In 2018, Dhananath Fernando won the Asia Think Tank Shark Tank championship for his research on the high cost of construction in Sri Lanka and his proposal to lower the taxes on construction materials. In 2019, Students for Liberty and Entrepreneurship (South Sudan) led by John Mustapha Kutiyote won the award for promoting home ownership by women. Students for Liberty Brasil won the 2021 Latin America competition for their project on educating Brazilian favela residents about property rights.