The Significance of Hans-Hermann Hoppe (2019)

by Stephan Kinsella on March 26, 2026

Blast from the past. Panel: The Significance of Hans-Hermann Hoppe. Austrian Economics Research Conference, Mises Institute 2019, Auburn, Ala.

1:15 — David Gordon “Hoppe and German Philosophy”
5:35 — Mark Thornton “Hoppe as Textbook Writer”
11:40 — Stephan Kinsella “Hoppe on Property Rights”
18:45 — Thomas DiLorenzo “Hoppean Political Economy vs. Public Choice”
28:14 — Jörg Guido Hülsmann “Hoppe as Mentor”
37:25 — Joseph Salerno “Hoppe and the Art of Economic Controversy”
49:40 — Response from Hans-Hermann Hoppe.

Transcript (Hoppe remarks)

Reflections on a Lifetime with the Mises Institute

[49:42]

I first want to thank Lew and Pat and Jeff and Joe for this wonderful celebration. I have to say that in the meantime I am about the oldest person here who has seen the Mises Institute become what it has become. I joined the Mises Institute in 1985, three years after the foundation of the Institute. I was also, I think, the first foreigner ever to have anything to do with the Mises Institute. At that time, to be a white heterosexual male was not yet a problem.

Growth of the Mises Institute and Personal Connections

Nowadays the problems have of course even aggravated, because apart from being a white heterosexual male I am a member of the even more hated group: that is, a German who does all this.

I saw the Mises Institute grow from the first place they had in Washington DC—that was a townhouse, one flat—then they moved to Auburn in a big barrack right next to, in the shadow of, the stadium. The next step was having some premises in the business college across the street. And then they started building this facility: first a smaller version and then the expanded version. I think there are not very many people here who have seen all of this.

I also got in contact very quickly with many of the people here in this room and made lifelong friends. Let me just mention the first hardcore group that met at Mises Institute conferences. David Gordon was always there, Jeff Herbener was there, Tom DiLorenzo, Joe Salerno, Walter Block. Yuri Maltsev came a few years later after he defected from Russia, and of course also Ralph Raico.¹ We were all Murray’s children. He always referred to us as his kids. We had sometimes disagreements among ourselves, but being Murray’s children we always pulled together when things got difficult.

Murray’s Children and the Growth of Austrian Libertarianism

At that time Mark Thornton was our kid. So was Guido, was one of our kids. one of our kids. Stephan Kinsella was one of the kids, and Peter Klein was one of the kids. Then there were also toddlers [laugher]: Bob Murphy for instance was a toddler, and so was Tom Woods.

In the meantime, as you see, the Austrian libertarian movement has become such a big thing that you don’t even know all the names anymore. We exist in … in the world around, there is practically no country where we do not have some Austro-libertarians. My work has been translated into 35 languages. I never imagined anything like this being possible.

German Philosophical Influences and Future Plans

Now let me make a few light-hearted remarks about the various comments. Obviously I cannot do justice to what they have said. As far as David [Gordon] is concerned, yes, I am a German and I have been influenced by German philosophers quite a bit. I think it is also an injustice that the German language has become a minor language in the meantime. At some point in history there was a chance that we might play the role as Germans that you guys now enjoy speaking English. But there exist very important German philosophers that have hardly ever been translated. I encountered or re-encountered recently a German philosopher who recently died, Peter Janich, who was a student of Paul Lorenzen, who was mentioned before by David Gordon, who made tremendous contributions to the theory of action. The man was completely unaware of Mises, but there are contributions and additions to Mises’s insights about action that I hope I will introduce to the English-speaking world in the near future, if God wills.

Mark Thornton with his textbook example, and Tom mentioned that also—I should mention how that book originated. I taught for a year at Johns Hopkins University in Bologna, and that was the first time that I ever had to lecture in English. So I wrote that book in longhand, and every lecture was carefully prepared because I was always afraid that I might run out of stuff to say. I had to make sure that I had enough paper and enough written up so that I could finish in an hour and a half in a foreign language. That’s why it turned out to be a little bit like a textbook, even though textbook writing is not my forte, I must say.

Contributions to Property Theory and Public Choice Critique

Stephan has already mentioned my contributions to the theory of property. I am still trying to refine this. I hope one more work I still have in myself to get that finally finished. What Tom said about the public choice school: when I decided to go to the United States I had a magnificent grant that allowed me to go wherever I wanted to go—the Heisenberg scholarship, the highest grant that you could win in the German university system. I was thinking where will you go? And I wrote letters to two people: one to Murray Rothbard, “I would like to work with you,” and to insure myself, I also wrote a letter to James Buchanan, who was at that time at Virginia Polytechnic in Blacksburg, Virginia. Both wrote back immediately. Jim Buchanan offered me far more: a private room, a secretary, and all the rest of it. Murray could not offer quite as much, but as soon as I got Murray’s letter I decided of course I go with Murray, because I had encountered the same difficulties that Tom mentioned about the public choice school—about these “conceptual agreements”—which are no agreements. And he had this unanimity rule, but this unanimity rule was only a quasi-unanimity rule. So I figured that is not exactly promising if I go there.

Anecdotes on Buchanan, Tullock, and Personal Reflections

I have never met Buchanan, but I did meet Gordon Tullock a few times. Gordon Tullock was a more caustic person. I met him incidentally at some conferences of the Moonies in Korea.² I should mention that the first big prize that Hayek received, long before he received a Nobel Prize, was also from the Moonies [laughter]. The Moonies had some sort of libertarian subgroup, and after the person who was in charge of that subgroup retired from his position [“Gerard Radnitzky, a Popperite who happened to like me and was close to Tony de Jasay” —SK], the Moonies appointed me for one year to be at the head of this committee. The result of that conference was the book The Myth of National Defense. After that conference the Moonies stopped with this type of panel.

At that occasion I asked Gordon Tullock what he thinks about this “conceptual agreement” and the “quasi-unanimity” [rule], and Gordon Tullock said, “No, this is all what Buchanan wrote. I wrote the rest of the book.” [Laughter]

Yeah, I think that …. All I want to say: I should make a remark about Guido’s stuff being so fierce. That used to be the case, but now my wife whips me into shape and now I am turning into the most lovable person. [laughter; applause] It is not exactly my nature to be the most lovable person, but I am trying very hard.

Yes, I do like to fight. I hate this intellectual disease of political correctness more and more, and I have to convince myself once in a while that I should not fight too much but get back to more important theoretical work, which I promise I will do. I will work hard and produce at least one more important work.

Closing Thanks

I thank you all very much, everyone who made remarks here. In particular, as I said, I am honored to have friends like you. Thank you very much.