Lenore T Ealy

Lenore T. Ealy, Ph.D.

An internationally respected institutional strategist, thought leader, and intellectual entrepreneur, I have over 30 years of experience spanning higher education, think tanks, nonprofits, and philanthropy. In my current role as Vicerrectora internacional at Universidad Francisco Marroquín in Guatemala,
I promote international partnerships and positioning for one of Latin America’s most prestigious universities, dedicated to teaching and disseminating the ethical, legal and economic principles of a society of free and responsible persons.

Since 2014 I have overseen governance, programming, and operations as Secretary of The Philadelphia Society, an association of thought leaders working to deepen understanding of the intellectual and institutional foundations of free and ordered societies.

Previously, I was senior fellow for communities at the Charles Koch Institute, and I have held program management positions at the Heritage Foundation, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, and the Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice.

I am currently a director of the Rising Tide Foundation (Switzerland), a member of the Mont Pelerin Society, a voting member of the American Institute for Economic Research, and a Member and Secretary/Executive Director of The Philadelphia Society, where I served as President 2012-13.

Education

I received a Bachelor of Science degree in science education with highest honors from Auburn University in 1983 and received the Master of Arts degree in history from the University of Alabama in 1990.   In 1997 I completed my doctoral degree in the history of early modern moral and political thought at The Johns Hopkins University.  My dissertation, directed by historian J. G. A. Pocock, addresses the thought of the seventeenth-century Cambridge Platonist, Ralph Cudworth.

Editorial & Publications

I currently serve as founder and co-editor for an academic book series, Polycentricity: Studies in Institutional Diversity and Voluntary Governance (Lexington Books). I also serve on the editorial boards of Economic Affairs and
The Independent Review and was an early contributor to Philanthropy Daily.

I have co-edited, with Robert Garnett and Paul Lewis, Commerce and Community: Ecologies of Social Cooperation (Routledge, 2015); with Steven Klugewicz, History, on Proper Principles: Essays in Honor of Forrest McDonald (ISI Books, 2010); and, with Robert C. Enlow, Liberty and Learning: Milton Friedman’s Voucher Idea at Fifty (Cato Press, 2006). I have published numerous articles and have been an invited speaker for numerous organizations.

More About My Work

My professional portfolio unites several skill sets—academic writing and editing, strategic program design, executive management, grant writing and fundraising. As the organizer of over 35 academic conferences and symposia, I have demonstrated a talent for identifying intellectual challenges, convening experts and eager learners, and catalyzing dynamic discussions across disciplinary boundaries.

As a scholar I spend most of my time working in the intersections of history, political economy, voluntary governance, and philanthropy. I believe interdisciplinary approaches help create generative conversations and research on the drivers of human freedom and flourishing.  My work primarily grapples with the fundamental question of how we can create and sustain a free, humane, and pluralistic social order in the face of the centralizing and bureaucratizing tendencies of modern governance. I look to the history of classical liberal thought; the theories of political economy, polycentricity, and constitutionalism; and the practice of voluntary governance and independent philanthropy as key elements of an alternative paradigm that can better secure meaningful individual freedom in ways that foster healthy pluralism, spur beneficial social innovation, and cultivate the foundations of a flourishing civilization.

The Philanthropic Enterprise

From 2000-2015, I led The Philanthropic Enterprise, a not-for-profit research institute that seeks to strengthen our understanding of how philanthropy and voluntary social cooperation promote human flourishing. In this capacity, I have cultivated a robust network of scholars, practitioners and donors paying attention to critical gaps in classical liberal understanding of the nature of liberty and social order and the role of philanthropy and voluntary action in a free society.  I also founded and served as editor 2004-14 of Conversations on Philanthropy.