Competitive Enterprise Institute

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The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) is a non-profit public policy organization founded in 1984 by Fred L. Smith, Jr. CEI's stated belief is that consumers are best helped not by government regulation of commercial interests, but by consumers being allowed to make their own choices in a free marketplace. CEI states that it promotes classical liberal ideals through analysis, education, coalition-building, advocacy, and regulation.[1] CEI offers analysis and advocacy on public policy issues such as energy, environment, biotechnology, pharmaceutical regulation, chemical risk, telecommunications, insurance, transportation, tobacco regulation, constitutional issues, economic policy and securities law.[2]

CEI is a think tank funded by donations from individuals, foundations and corporations. CEI does not accept government funding. Past and present funders include the Scaife Foundations, Exxon Mobil the Ford Motor Company Fund, Pfizer, and the Earhart Foundation[3][4]. (More details below.) CEI cites its major issues of concern as Environmental Policy, Regulation and Economic Liberty, Legal and Constitutional, and Health and Safety. Among the methods used to implement the organization's agenda are various press releases and policy papers, testifying at governmental hearings, suits against various governmental agencies, paid advertising, editorial and op-ed pieces, open letters, books, and NGO operations. CEI's most recent television ad campaign, entitled A Bright Future For Some, focused on energy policy and global warming, criticizing policies advocated by former Vice President Al Gore. The CEI ad aired nation-wide in March and April, 2008.

Contents

[edit] Policy areas

[edit] Environmental Policy

CEI promotes free-market environmentalism and says market institutions are more effective in protecting the environment than is government.

Among other things, CEI has been an outspoken opponent of government action on global warming that would require limits on greenhouse gas emissions. In March 1992, CEI’s founder Fred Smith said of global warming: "Most of the indications right now are it looks pretty good. Warmer winters, warmer nights, no effects during the day because of clouding, sounds to me like we’re moving to a more benign planet, more rain, richer, easier productivity to agriculture". [1]

One of CEI's projects is the Cooler Heads Coalition, which operates the website globalwarming.org. Myron Ebell is the chairman of the coalition and the Director of Energy and Global Warming Policy at CEI.

As part of CEI's work on global warming policy, in May 2008 it published a book by Václav Klaus, President of the Czech Republic and keynote speaker at CEI's annual dinner in 2008. The book is entitled Blue Planet in Green Shackles: What is Endangered, Climate or Freedom? The book argues that the politics of global warming policy are about human freedom, not the environment. Klaus argues that poor countries face the danger of being harmed by environmentalists who want to "[halt] human progress at immense costs" with "no significant effect" on global warming.

In December of 2005 CEI participated in the UNFCCC negotiations in Montreal as an NGO, sending back several dispatches summarizing events of the conference [2].

In a 2006 letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury (after the Archbishop urged Christians to take action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions), the CEI said that reducing these levels, even in "baby steps," would "result in the deaths of more people in the U.S. than global warming would worldwide". [3]

[edit] Regulation

CEI uses think tank and advocacy methods to support activities in various areas, such as antitrust and government regulation, in matters including corporate welfare, Internet and E-Commerce, and Privacy and Security. They have caused or influenced subjects in the area, including matters involving CAFE, rent control, FDA proposals, and the FTC. One of the CEI's projects related to this is The Warren T. Brookes Journalism Fellowship.

[edit] Legal and constitutional

CEI is also active in the legal aspects of antitrust and government regulation. The Project on Technology & Innovation is extending CEI's efforts into new areas, including antitrust in high tech and network industries, privacy, e-commerce, intellectual property, and telecommunications.

CEI opposes a range of regulatory intervention into commercial activities including bans on alcohol advertising, fuel economy mandates and proposals to mitigate global warming. CEI supports constitutional checks over government's power over corporations.

[edit] Health and safety

CEI criticises health and safety regulation and argues through its Death by Regulation project that overregulation itself can be deadly. For example, they have claimed that automotive downsizing due to federal fuel economy standards may increase road accident deaths, and have criticised the delayed availability of new medical therapies due to Food and Drug Administration rules. CEI scholars have also claimed that the health risks of secondhand smoke have not been adequately proven, and thus restrictions on smoking are unwarranted.[5]

[edit] CEI Events

[edit] Annual Dinner

Every year, CEI hosts an annual dinner gala and presents the Julian L. Simon Memorial Award. The 2008 CEI gala was held on May 28 in Washington, D.C. and featured Václav Klaus, President of the Czech Republic, as keynote speaker and Julian L. Simon Memorial Award recipient.[4] The Simon award honors the work of the late economist, winner of the Simon-Ehrlich wager. Jonah Goldberg, author of Liberal Fascism, served as master of ceremonies for the event.

[edit] CEI Projects

[edit] Warren T. Brookes[5] Journalism Fellowship

In 1991, CEI established the Warren T. Brookes Fellowship to identify and train journalists who wish to improve their knowledge of environmental issues and free market economics. In this manner, the program seeks to perpetuate the legacy of Warren Brookes, who was a longtime journalist with the Boston Herald and the Detroit News and a nationally-syndicated columnist.

Former + Current Fellows

1993 - Ronald Bailey

1994 - Michael Fumento

1995 - Michelle Malkin

1996 - James Bovard

1997-1998 - Jesse Walker

1999 - Brian Doherty

2000-2001 - Sean Paige

2001-2002 - Eileen Ciesla-Norcross

2002-2003 - Hugo Gurdon

2003-2004 - Neil Hrab

2004-2005 - John Berlau

2005-2006 – Timothy Carney

2006-2007 - Jeremy Lott

2007-2008 - Lene Johansen

[edit] Bureaucrash

Bureaucrash, a special outreach and activist project of CEI, is described as an international network of pro-freedom activists working to promote a political ideology based on personal and economic freedom. Bureaucrash conducts political activism using new media, creative marketing, and education campaigns. Bureaucrash maintains a website (bureaucrash.com) and a channel on YouTube (Bureaucrash TV), which features short videos on political topics.

[edit] CEI Staff

CEI lists its Adjunct Scholars and twenty-five full-time staff members, their titles, and major area of responsibility on its website.[6]. Some notable staff members include:

[edit] Criticism

In May 2006, CEI released a controversial ad campaign with two television commercials [7] arguing that global warming is not a problem. The commercials used the tagline "Carbon Dioxide - They call it pollution; We call it life." One ad stated that the world's glaciers are "growing, not melting... getting thicker, not thinner."[6] The ad cited two Science articles to support its claims. However, the editor for Science stated that the ad "misrepresents the conclusions of the two cited Science papers... by selective referencing". The author of the articles, Curt Davis, director of the Center for Geospatial Intelligence at the University of Missouri-Columbia, said CEI was misrepresenting his previous research to back their claims. "These television ads are a deliberate effort to confuse and mislead the public about the global warming debate," he said. [8]

The second ad in the campaign claimed that carbon dioxide is misrepresented as a pollutant, stating that "it’s essential to life. We breathe it out. Plants breathe it in... They call it pollution. We call it life."[6]

Individuals associated with CEI have also been criticised. In January 2006, it was reported in The New Republic that Steven Milloy, then an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute had written extensively on global warming and other topics while receiving undisclosed funding from ExxonMobil.[7][8][9][10] Milloy's association with the Cato Institute ended shortly afterwards and he is now an adjunct analyst at CEI.[11]

Recently, President of American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) Michael T. Eckhart sent Marlo Lewis, senior fellow of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) threatening letter vowing to "destroy" his career:

"It is my intention to destroy your career as a liar," Mr. Eckhart wrote. "If you produce one more editorial against climate change, I will launch a campaign against your professional integrity. I will call you a liar and charlatan to the Harvard community of which you and I are members. I will call you out as a man who has been bought by Corporate America. Go ahead, guy. Take me on."[12]

[edit] Funding

In its IRS Form 990 for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2004, CEI reported revenues totalling $2,919,537, including donations from individuals, foundations and corporations. Its net assets were $1,670,808. Salaries and benefits to its top employees were reported as:

  • Fred L. Smith, President, $175,000
  • Marlo Lewis, Senior Fellow, $100,000
  • Sam Kazman, General Counsel, $98,000

According to page nine of a report from the CEI contained on the University of California, San Francisco's Legacy Tobacco Documents Library (LTDL), the following companies and foundations were among those listed as supporting CEI's work with annual contributions of at least $10,000, currently the CEI's "Entrepreneurs" level:

Aequus Institute, Amoco Foundation, Inc., Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, Coca-Cola Company, E.L. Craig Foundation, CSX Corporation, Earhart Foundation, Fieldstead and Co., FMC Foundation, Ford Motor Company Fund, Gilder Foundation, Koch Family Foundations (including the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, David H. Koch Charitable Foundation, and Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation), Philip M. McKenna Foundation, Inc., Curtis and Edith Munson Foundation, Philip Morris Companies, Inc., Pfizer Inc., Precision Valve Corporation, Prince Foundation, Rodney Fund, Sheldon Rose, Scaife Foundations (Carthage Foundation and Sarah Scaife Foundation), and Texaco, Inc. (Texaco Foundation).

Other documents in the LTDL show that CEI has received funding directly from various tobacco companies.[9],[10],[11] For example, the listing on the Philip Morris Glossary of Names: C gives the note "Received public policy grant from Philip Morris (1995); Pro-market public interest group dedicated to advancing the principles of free enterprise and limited government."

ExxonMobil Corporation was a major donor to CEI, with over $2 million in contributions between 1998 and 2005. [12] In 2002 the company gave $405,000;[13] in 2004 it gave CEI $180,000 that was earmarked for "global climate change and global climate change outreach." [13] In 2006, the company announced that they had ended their funding for the group.[14]

[edit] Governance

The organization is governed by a board of directors. The current board of directors consists of: William Dunn, Michael Greve, Leonard Liggio, Thomas Gale Moore, William O'Keefe, Frances Smith, and Fred Smith.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Self-description on National Survey of Oncologists
  2. ^ Issues | CEI
  3. ^ The Tempest Washington Post, by Joel Achenbach, May 28, 2006
  4. ^ Competitive Enterprise Institute SourceWatch Encyclopedia
  5. ^ Jerome C. Arnett, Is the public health message on secondhand smoke based on science? Skin and Allergy News, 38(2):13, 2007.
  6. ^ a b Bank, Justin (2006-05-26). Scientist to CEI: You Used My Research To "Confuse and Mislead". FactCheck.org. Retrieved on 2006-05-30.
  7. ^ "Smoked Out: Pundit For Hire", published in The New Republic, accessed 20 Sept 2006. Also available without subscription at FreePress.net.
  8. ^ PRWatch.org article detailing Milloy's ties to the tobacco industry, accessed 23 Sept 2006.
  9. ^ Scientists' Report Documents ExxonMobil’s Tobacco-like Disinformation Campaign on Global Warming Science. Union of Concerned Scientists (3 January 2007). Retrieved on 2007-01-11.
  10. ^ Some Like It Hot, Mother Jones article on Milloy
  11. ^ CEI Experts. Retrieved on 2008-03-07.
  12. ^ Inside the Beltway�-�-�The Washington Times, America's Newspaper. Retrieved on 2008-03-07.
  13. ^ Exxon-Mobil 2005 annual giving (donations) report: Competitive Enterprise Institute, Washington, D.C., General Operating Support 90,000, General Operating Support* 180,000 ,Total 270,000 2005 annual giving report

[edit] External links

[edit] Critics