Below I’ll give you my selections for the best Thomas Sowell books by a few categories. I will cover these and other great books more in depth later.
1. Black Rednecks and White Liberals (2006)
This explosive new book challenges many of the long-prevailing assumptions about blacks, about Jews, about Germans, about slavery, and about education. Plainly written, powerfully reasoned, and backed with a startling array of documented facts, Black Rednecks and White Liberals takes on not only the trendy intellectuals of our times but also such historic interpreters of American life as Alexis de Tocqueville and Frederick Law Olmsted. In a series of long essays, this book presents an in-depth look at key beliefs behind many mistaken and dangerous actions, policies, and trends. It presents…
2. A Conflict of Visions: Ideological Origins of Political Struggles (2007)
Controversies in politics arise from many sources, but the conflicts that endure for generations or centuries show a remarkably consistent pattern. This revised edition of a classic analyzes the centuries-long debates about the nature of reason, justice, equality, and power. It distinguishes between those with the “constrained” vision, which sees human nature as enduring and self-centered, and the “unconstrained” vision, in which human nature is malleable and perfectible. A Conflict of Visions offers a compelling case that these opposing visions are behind the ethical and ideological…
3. Economic Facts and Fallacies, 2nd edition (2011)
In Economic Facts and Fallacies, Thomas Sowell exposes some of the most popular fallacies about economic issues in a lively manner that does not require any prior knowledge of economics. These fallacies include many beliefs widely disseminated in the media and by politicians, such as fallacies about urban problems, income differences, male-female economic differences, as well as economic fallacies about academia, about race, and about Third World countries.Sowell shows that fallacies are not simply crazy ideas but in fact have a certain plausibility that gives them their staying power–and makes careful examination of their flaws both…
4. Intellectuals and Society (2012)
The influence of intellectuals is not only greater than in previous eras but also takes a very different form from that envisioned by those like Machiavelli and others who have wanted to directly influence rulers. It has not been by shaping the opinions or directing the actions of the holders of power that modern intellectuals have most influenced the course of events, but by shaping public opinion in ways that affect the actions of power holders in democratic societies, whether or not those power holders accept the general vision or the particular policies favored by intellectuals. Even government leaders with…
5. The Vision of the Anointed: Self-Congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy (1996)
The Vision of the Anointed is a devastating critique of the mind-set behind the failed social policies of the past thirty years. Thomas Sowell sees what has happened not as a series of isolated mistakes but as a logical consequence of a vision whose defects have led to disasters in education, crime, family disintegration, and other social pathology. In this book, “politically correct” theory is repeatedly confronted with facts — and sharp contradictions between the two are explained in terms of a whole set of self-congratulatory assumptions held by political and intellectual elites. These elites — the anointed — often consider…
6. The Best of Thomas Sowell (2014)
The Best of Thomas Sowell is for fans and foes of Dr. Sowell’s remarkable intellectual career; as well as those who have yet to experience his cognitive clarity, rarity, and dexterity. Carefully sorted by topic, over 30 years of unmatched writing from his numerous books and widely popular op-eds are now at your fingertips. The Best of Thomas Sowell is a resource you will turn to time and time again for inspiration and quotation of the paradoxical facts and wisdom that only Dr. Sowell can provide….
7. The Quest for Cosmic Justice (2002)
This is not a comforting book — it is a book about disturbing issues that are urgently important today and enduringly critical for the future. It rejects both “merit” and historical redress as principles for guiding public policy. It shows how “peace” movements have led to war and to needless casualties in those wars. It argues that “equality” is neither right nor wrong, but meaningless. The Quest for Cosmic Justice shows how confused conceptions of justice end up promoting injustice, how confused conceptions of equality end up promoting inequality, and how the tyranny of social visions…
8. The Housing Boom and Bust: Revised Edition (2010)
Scary headlines and scarier statistics tell the story of a financial crisis on a scale not seen in decades—certainly not within the lifetime of most Americans. Moreover, this is a worldwide financial crisis. Financial institutions on both sides of the Atlantic have either collapsed or have been saved from collapse by government bailouts, as a result of buying securities based on American housing values that eroded or evaporated.Now completely revised in paperback, The Housing Boom and Bust is designed to unravel the tangled threads of that…
9. Trickle Down Theory and Tax Cuts for the Rich (2012)
This essay unscrambles gross misconceptions that have made rational debates about tax policies virtually impossible for decades….
10. Inside American Education (2003)
An indictment of the American educational system criticizes the fact that the system has discarded the traditional goals of transmitting knowledge and fostering cognitive skills in favor of building self-esteem and promoting social harmony….
11. Knowledge And Decisions (1996)
With a new preface by the author, this reissue of Thomas Sowell's classic study of decision making updates his seminal work in the context of The Vision of the Annointed, Sowell, one of America's most celebrated public intellectuals, describes in concrete detail how knowledge is shared and disseminated throughout modern society. He warns that society suffers from an ever-widening gap between firsthand knowledge and decision making—a gap that threatens not only our economic and political efficiency, but our very freedom because actual…
12. Race And Culture: A World View (1995)
Encompassing more than a decade of research around the globe, this book shows that cultural capital has far more impact than politics, prejudice, or genetics on the social and economic fates of minorities, nations, and civilization….
13. Ever Wonder Why? And Other Controversial Essays (2006)
Thomas Sowell takes aim at a range of legal, social, racial, educational, and economic issues in this latest collection of his controversial, never boring, always thought-provoking essays. From “gun control myths” to “mealy mouth media” to “free lunch medicine,” Sowell gets to the heart of the matters we all care about with his characteristically unsparing candor….
14. Controversial Essays (Hoover Institution Press Publication) (2002)
One of conservatism’s most articulate voices dissects today’s most important economic, racial, political, education, legal, and social issues, sharing his entertaining and thought-provoking insights on a wide range of contentious subjects. –“This book contains an abundance of wisdom on a large number of economic issues.” –Mises Review…
Best Thomas Sowell Books That You Need
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Charter Schools and Their Enemies
Author(s): Thomas Sowell
Publisher: , Year: 2020, Size: 13 Mb, Download: epub
ID: 2559059
Discrimination and Disparities
Author(s): Thomas Sowell
Publisher: Basic Books, Year: 2019, Size: 514 Kb, Download: epub
ID: 2482486
Wealth, Poverty and Politics: An International Perspective
Author(s): Thomas Sowell
Publisher: Basic Books, Year: 2015, Size: 4 Mb, Download: pdf
ID: 1392536
Please note that this booklist is not final. Some books are really chart-busters according to Washington Post, others are drafted by unknown authors. On top of that, you can always find additional tutorials and courses on Coursera, Udemy or edX, for example. Are there any other relevant links you could recommend? Drop a comment if you have any feedback on the list.