The Institute of Economic Affairs was founded in 1955, as a research educational charity, to examine the role of ‘markets and pricing systems as technical devices for registering preferences and apportioning resources’. The IEA is financed by a series of voluntary contributions, sales of publications and conference fees, but has ensured that it is not over‐dependant on a particular source of income to guarantee academic independence. The IEA began to publish regularly in 1957, with much of its work based on micro‐economic analysis. Whilst remaining conspicuously free of any political organisation, the Institute has been able to provide a consistent alternative analysis to the collectivist macro‐economic hegemony, which existed from the 1950s to 1970s. Much of the success of the IEA came during the 1970s, when politicians began to question the role of the state in economic life. Through publications IEA authors had caused the prevailing intellectual climate to be re‐considered, with the benefits of markets...