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posted: November 27, 2025
tl;dr: A condensed summary of the mistakes that social justice crusaders make in their arguments...
Thomas Sowell occupies an esteemed position on the list of the left’s most hated authors. Ayn Rand tops that list, but Sowell is not far behind. As Sowell explains in Social Justice Fallacies the arguments against his views are most often ad hominem, which he counters with facts and evidence, as he does throughout this book. Sowell attracts extreme vitriol not only because his conservative views run counter to what people of his race are supposed to believe, but also because he began his academic career as a standard-issue Ivy League Marxist. Sowell changed his views drastically when he started looking for evidence that the left’s policies were having a positive impact on the lower classes, the people they were supposed to help. He found the opposite.
Sowell focuses intently on empirical evidence and studies, which is actually what economists are supposed to do. When investigating why different groups have different outcomes, he takes a broad view, examining evidence outside the United States and at different points in time. All too often supposed experts focus myopically on just one population at one point in time, and try to predict how different policies would affect that one group.
This mistake was made repeatedly during the COVID-19 pandemic. Why did Sweden, with its very different public health recommendations, have a lower excess death rate than other developed countries? Why did other developed countries make such different recommendations on who should take the COVID-19 vaccine, with the United States being an outlier in recommending it for six month-olds? Why are overall vaccine recommendations so different across different countries when all are able to look at the same trial studies? Who has the better outcomes when looking at health and life expectancy? Sowell believes there are natural experiments happening at all points in time and everywhere, and scours history and the globe looking for empirical evidence.
Contrary to what his critics may believe, Sowell doesn’t deny the existence of racism. He does, however, ask what its impact is compared to other factors. Cultural differences, differences in family structure and child-rearing environment, and government policies all impact the outcomes realized by different groups, as Sowell shows. Racism does not often appear to be the dominant factor. Sowell does not believe that true equality of outcome can ever be achieved, as there are always differences among groups. He instead builds a case that what we have is “reciprocal inequality”, with different groups achieving different outcomes due to group differences that have very little to do with race.
Sowell dusts off the history books to show that early 20th century progressives believed in genetic determinism and eugenics. Those progressives ignored evidence to the contrary, the same way that today’s progressives ignore evidence of factors other than racism causing disparities in outcomes. The common thread among progressives, Sowell argues, is that they want to be surrogate decision makers, making decisions on behalf of others by usurping freedoms. “Government knows best” is an all too pervasive attitude among those in power.
Social Justice Fallacies contains far too much common sense for some. Those people will ignore it or denigrate it without reading it. But for those who are new to Thomas Sowell, or those who want a refresher, I highly recommend it.