The Basic Problem
Below is the first question and answer from A New Textbook of Americanism: The Politics of Ayn Rand. Begun in 1946 by Rand as an antidote to the spread of European collectivist ideas, the text explores fundamental issues in a question and answer format. Rand never completed the series but this recently released volume features contemporary Objectivist scholars answering the questions she did not, as well as some previously unpublished text by Rand. The first question asks: What is the…