Freedom and Prosperity - celebrating a decade of work

On the New Year's eve of 2009-2010, exactly 10 years ago, an excitement different from that of typical New Year's celebration was going through my body. With sound of fireworks in distance, it was the night when several prior months of project planing web development, content translation, learning resources creation, multimedia repository, and a final personal oath to self to dedicate 5 years of work to a project that promotes previously unheard of and – as it was quickly to be discovered - unpopular and unwanted ideas of freedom, in a society that only knows and values big government collectivism, were brought to life in form of a multimedia think tank website and supporting social media platforms, which are known as Sloboda i prosperitet (Freedom and Prosperity).

How it all began

A few years earlier, in 2007, by listening to a humble US Congressman from Texas speaking at the first 2008 Republican debate for president of the United States, I was intellectually struck by the Ron Paul Revolution so hard that it changed my life in an instant. Eager to find other like minded people, when a quick Google search returned zero results to Serbian and Croatian keywords about libertarianism such as 'libertarijanizam', 'libertarijanac', 'libertijanizam', 'libertijanac', and a realization that I was a lone nut without a single lead in the region that would bring me to the herd I now belonged, I knew right then that something had to be done.

As a student librarian during my university years, I learned to appreciate properly organized and accessible information, and have worked on cataloging, storing, and retrieving it for students and professors. With the Internet now coming of age, it was clear that an easily searchable and retrievable online multimedia depository would be enough to bring libertarian ideas out the door to the masses, or at least to those who purposefully went out in search of it in local languages of the Western Balkans region. The idea kept getting stronger in my mind, as was spending next couple of years reading and taking notes from works of famous libertarian thinkers from around the world. After literally leaving no stones unturned, realizing that there is literally nothing of the vast libertarian literature available translated in local languages whatsoever, observing an absolute zero coverage of the Ron Paul Revolution in our regional mainstream media, and at the time only a slight improvement in bare registering of the above-mentioned libertarian search terms - leading to few contentious forum discussions in Croatia and Serbia, had all finally turned my frustration into action. And so began a three months long web project with delivery deadline on midnight on January 1st, 2010.

The humble beginnings

In its humble beginnings, from the moment of publishing its web domain, announcing to search engines webcrawlers, and setting its YouTube and Twitter account to public, Freedom and Prosperity project did not actively seek publicity, but kept a low profile while still building up its back then very modest educational multimedia repository. Our video collection included Ken Schoolland's Philosophy of Liberty, Friedrich Hayek's The Road to Serfdom stills in video format, several video excerpts from Milton Friedman's Free to Choose series, a couple of CATO Institute concept explanatory videos, a video from G Edward Griffin, a video from Yugoslav market reformist Ante Markovic, and couple of in house created libertarian introductory videos.

As expected, first couple of months went by quietly, with several emails from like minded individuals who were themselves looking for the exit out of the collectivist darkness, thanking us for libertarian articles and videos we've translated from English, and congratulating us for the project initiative. It was a greatly welcoming boost into the wings of the still one man effort, communication which eventually leaked the project's existence on a liberal blog from Serbia under the name Tržišno rešenje, that quickly popularized the Sloboda i prosperitet website and itsYouTube channel.

While the initial intent was to promote ideas of freedom in Bosnia and Herzegovina, due to the fact that the entire content of our library is understandable by people in Serbia, Croatia, and Montenegro, and even by older generations in Slovenia and Macedonia (due to official language policy in Yugoslavia), it soon became clear that the number of visitors from those countries was approaching and even exceeding those from Bosnia and Herzegovina. That revelation soon brought about a split of the project in two: 1) Campaign for Freedom and Prosperity BiH - my home country freedom initiative think tank, and 2) Freedom and Prosperity TV – regional multimedia educational project.

Volunteers

Soon after the project split in two, we began receiving volunteers. Some of them focused in helping further the message of freedom in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Some helped build up the freedom library. Some conducted interviews with libertarian personalities around the world. And some focused in publishing content in Slovenian and Macedonian languages as well. In total, there have been around 15 different volunteers contributing to the project at different times so far. Some have stayed around and continue contributing occasionally, some have moved on to starting libertarian and classical liberal projects of their own, some have become social media keyboard warriors, and some have gone back to business or are otherwise tied up in their own busy lives.

Our contributions in the past 10 years

Up to now, we have built a strong libertarian library of both in house created and translated articles, educational videos, and interviews of libertarian personalities on our multimedia website and YouTube channel, covering every issue imaginable. Our bilingual YouTube collection is especially valuable, containing selected nuggets of wisdom in short format for easy access and learning.

We have perhaps been the only media that exposes negative truths about European Union, through writing articles and translating heated debates in the EU Parliament. Regional mainstream media has been very diligent in avoiding coverage from the European Parliament, where euro-skeptic MP's have been confronting collectivist doctrines that restrict individual freedom and regulate markets. Even some so called classical liberal think tanks have shied away from criticizing the communitarian EU empire. Therefore, it is no coincidence that the great majority of populations of countries of former Yugoslavia are by default still pro EU, despite the looming Brexit issue. We would like to put much more effort in reporting and public education in this regard.

We've helped promote other regional and international startup libertarian organizations and blogs through our social media platforms, provided advice and technical assistance. Promoted their projects and events.

This past year we've started a new project by the name 'Libertarian Minute', which gathers libertarian intellects of all walks of life in creating short educational videos about trending political issues and libertarian philosophy in general.

Our other ongoing contributions include giving advice to libertarian minded individuals and helping them find connections and friends on social media, providing advice to public office candidates in focusing their policies to benefit the individual while minimizing the government's role, and assisting students conducting research in libertarian philosophy and free market economics.

Where do we go from here

Thirteen years ago, when the Ron Paul Revolution swept the United States and the globe, mainstream media in countries of former Yugoslavia acted as in unison by refusing to do their job. It took efforts of handful of small alternative open source media enthusiasts and defenders of individual freedom and free market capitalism to disturb the sound of silence and ignite the flame of liberty in in the hearts and minds of ever increasing number of people.

Our mainstream media is still hard at work doing what it does best. Not only does it keep the public away from successes of freedom policies around the world, but it also shuns our local champions of freedom that have sprang up over the past decade. The alternative libertarian media and think tanks, though growing in numbers and variety, still have a long way to go until they can make significant impact in influencing the public at large.

Though the Freedom and Prosperity project was meant to run for 5 years, placing its bets in being made redundant and unnecessary by an eventual arrival of more professional multimedia organizations as libertarianism gains popularity, the libertarian movement in Western Balkans unfortunately has not yet gained that much traction to create market for that next level of libertarian media professionalism. Besides, other than by works of the Freedom and Prosperity, there has not been any significant interest in making the works of foreign libertarian organizations available for public use in our local languages. We will therefore continue our work and maintain our educational library, as still the best self help resource for our indoctrinated and apathetic populace, which still lacks the understanding of what it means to be free and is unable to distinguish between free market capitalism and crony capitalism, to name a few.

We must also continue our libertarian NGO think tank work, because other so called libertarian and classical liberal NGO's have been susceptible to watering down their missions, be it for reasons of not fully believing in individual freedom to begin with, be it for the sake of becoming more politically acceptable to the collectivist realities of today, or simply having to sell out to special interests or reach for the government purse in order to support lifestyles as professional career think tankers.

Freedom and Prosperity's non-registered status from the very start, its reliance on volunteer work from true libertarian enthusiasts who support themselves by working real jobs in the marketplace, and thus requiring minimal and private-only financial burden, keeps the project true to its original mission of defending and promoting libertarian ideals, free from outside influence and relatively safe from government's watchful eye.

Advance of Internet which brought the world to our fingertips, has enabled libertarians the world over to grow their movement much faster than was possible in the past. If we measure our regional libertarian progression by Murray Rothbard's 'Six Stages of Libertarian Movement', within the past 13 years, starting with the Ron Paul moment in 2007, we've got from level one - 'lone nut stage' up to level four – 'circle stage', and even level five - 'movement-activism stage' in couple of countries. We have gone from lone nuts wandering around alone to libertarian friendship gatherings, conducting meetings, to movement infighting and splitting. As more and more freedom enthusiasts continue to acquire leadership skills and contribute in growing the libertarian movement, we may reach the emergence of the stage six – 'political party stage', perhaps before the end of this decade.

Lightning speed evolution of the libertarian movement of whose transformation and growth in the last 10 years we have had the pleasure to witnesses and participate in, friendships that we've gained in the region and around the world, the lives we changed, vast knowledge and wisdom that we've gathered, nurtured and propagated, altogether should provide a great deal of satisfaction and optimism to all libertarians for an even brighter future. Happy New (2020-2030) Decade to us all!