The success of NBL prompted Branden to expand his lecture organization into the Nathaniel Branden Institute

Nathaniel Branden Institute

The Nathaniel Branden Institute was an organization founded by Nathaniel Branden in 1958 to promote Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism. The institute was responsible for the many Objectivist lectures and presentations across the United States of America...

 (NBI). Rand and Branden also co-founded the first publication devoted to the study and application of Objectivism. The Objectivist Newsletter began publication in 1962 and was later expanded into The Objectivist.

The Nathaniel Branden Institute

The 1960s saw a rapid expansion of the Objectivist movement. Rand was a frequent lecturer at universities across the country. Rand hosted a radio program on Objectivism on the Columbia University station, WKCR. NBI hosted lectures on Objectivism, the history of philosophy, art, and psychology in cities across the country (see the Nathaniel Branden Institute

Nathaniel Branden Institute

The Nathaniel Branden Institute was an organization founded by Nathaniel Branden in 1958 to promote Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism. The institute was responsible for the many Objectivist lectures and presentations across the United States of America...

). Campus clubs devoted to studying Rand’s philosophy formed throughout the country, though operated independently of NBI. Rand was a frequent guest on radio and television, as well as an annual lecturer at the Ford Hall Forum. At the peak of its popularity, NBI was delivering taped lectures in over 80 cities. By 1968 NBI had arranged for the lease of an entire floor in the Empire State Building (which would have been shared with Barbara Branden's book club and The Objectivist).

In 1968, Rand publicly broke with Nathaniel and Barbara Branden. She accused Nathaniel Branden of a "gradual departure from the principles of Objectivism," financial exploitation of her related to business loans, and "deliberate deception of several persons." In a response sent to the mailing list of The Objectivist in 1968, the Brandens denied many of Rand's charges against them. The result of their conflicting claims was a "schism," as some participants in the Objectivist movement supported the Brandens, while others supported Rand's repudiation of them. Robert L. Bradley, Jr. has called the dissolution of NBI an "organizational failure" in the Objectivist movement "as stunning as the collapse of Enron in a different context"; he charges Rand with "resorting to half-truths" and concludes that she "would never own up to the circumstances leading to the split, personally or publicly."

NBI was closed and its offices vacated, in an environment that Barbara Branden described as "total hysteria" as its former students learned about the matter. The Brandens continued for a time to sell some of NBI's recorded lectures through a new company, but otherwise had little involvement with the Objectivist movement until their biographical books about Rand were released. The Objectivist continued publishing with Rand as editor and Leonard Peikoff as associate editor. Peikoff also took over Nathaniel Branden's role as the primary lecturer on Objectivism. Peikoff later described the Brandens' expulsion as the first "of the many schisms that have plagued the Objectivist movement."

The 1970s

In the 1970s, Rand gave fewer public speeches, concentrating on nonfiction writing and helping the work of her students and associates. In the period from 1969 through 1971, Rand gave four workshops for a dozen professionals in philosophy and a few in math and physics on her book, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology

Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology

Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, published in 1979, is Ayn Rand's essentialised summation of the Objectivist theory of concepts and solution to the problem of universals...

. The Objectivist was replaced by The Ayn Rand Letter in 1971. While The Objectivist had published articles by many authors, The Ayn Rand Letter, marketed as a personal newsletter from Ayn Rand, published only her work (plus occasionally Leonard Peikoff's).

Throughout the decade, Peikoff continued to offer a number of lecture series on various topics related to Objectivism to large audiences, often incorporating new philosophic material. Rand worked closely with Peikoff, helping edit his book, The Ominous Parallels, for which she wrote the introduction. In mid-1979, Rand's associate Peter Schwartz

Peter Schwartz (writer)

Peter Schwartz is a writer and journalist who follows the Objectivist philosophy of Ayn Rand. He was the original editor for The Intellectual Activist and has contributed to books that reprint articles by Rand and other Objectivist writers, such as The Voice of Reason and Return of the Primitive:...

 began editing and publishing The Intellectual Activist, a publication which Rand recommended to her audience. Another associate of hers during this period was Harry Binswanger

Harry Binswanger

Harry Binswanger is an American philosopher and writer. He is an Objectivist and was a long-time associate of Ayn Rand, working with her on The Ayn Rand Lexicon. His doctoral dissertation, in the philosophy of biology, presented a new theory of the goal-directedness of living action, in opposition...

, whom she advised on his mini-encyclopedia of Objectivism, The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z. After the close of The Objectivist Calendar, a short publication listing upcoming events within the Objectivist movement, Binswanger began editing and publishing The Objectivist Forum, a bimonthly journal on Objectivism which had Rand's support and for which she served as "philosophic consultant."

Upon Rand's death, on March 6, 1982, Peikoff inherited her estate, including the control of the copyrights to her books and writing (barring the public domain Anthem

Anthem (novella)

Anthem is a dystopian fiction novella by Ayn Rand, written in 1937 and first published in 1938 in England. It takes place at some unspecified future date when mankind has entered another dark age characterized by irrationality, collectivism, and socialistic thinking and economics...

). Shortly after Rand’s death, Peikoff’s first book, The Ominous Parallels, was published. In 1983, Peikoff gave a series of lectures titled Understanding Objectivism, for the purpose of improving the methodology used in studying Objectivism, as a corrective to what he describes as the "Rationalist" and the "Empiricist" methods of thought.

The Ayn Rand Institute

In 1985, Leonard Peikoff

Leonard Peikoff

Leonard S. Peikoff is a Canadian-American philosopher. He is an author, a leading advocate of Objectivism and the founder of the Ayn Rand Institute. A former professor of philosophy, he was designated by the novelist Ayn Rand as heir to her estate...

 and Ed Snider

Ed Snider

Edward M. Snider is the American Chairman of Comcast Spectacor, a Philadelphia-based sports and entertainment company that owns the Philadelphia Flyers of the NHL, the Wells Fargo Center, the Spectrum, the regional sports network Comcast SportsNet and Global Spectrum, an international facilities...

 founded the Ayn Rand Institute

Ayn Rand Institute

The Ayn Rand Institute: The Center for the Advancement of Objectivism is a 501 nonprofit think tank in Irvine, California that promotes Ayn Rand's philosophy, called Objectivism. It was established in 1985, three years after Rand's death, by Leonard Peikoff, Rand's legal heir...

 (ARI), the first organization devoted to the study and advocacy of Objectivism since the closure of NBI in 1968. The institute began by sponsoring essay contests on Rand’s novels and distributing op-eds analyzing world events from an Objectivist perspective. In 1987 the institute began teaching aspiring Objectivist academics.

The Peikoff-Kelley split

In 1989, there was another major split within the Objectivist movement. As Brian Doherty

Brian Doherty (journalist)

Brian Doherty is an American journalist. He is a Senior Editor at Reason magazine. He is the author of This Is Burning Man: The Rise of a New American Underground , Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement and Gun Control on Trial: Inside the...

 describes it, David Kelley

David Kelley

David Kelley is an American philosopher, author, and advocate of Objectivism. He is founder and senior fellow of The Atlas Society. He lives in Washington, D.C..-Education and career:...

, a philosopher and lecturer then affiliated with ARI, was "booted from the official Objectivist world" for disagreeing "about the inherent evils of Barbara Branden's Rand biography" and "publicly defend[ing] on principle the notion of Objectivists talking to libertarians."

Kelley was criticized by Peter Schwartz

Peter Schwartz (writer)

Peter Schwartz is a writer and journalist who follows the Objectivist philosophy of Ayn Rand. He was the original editor for The Intellectual Activist and has contributed to books that reprint articles by Rand and other Objectivist writers, such as The Voice of Reason and Return of the Primitive:...

 for giving a speech under the auspices of Laissez Faire Books (LFB)

Laissez Faire Books

Laissez Faire Books is an online bookseller that was originally based in New York City when it first opened in 1972. The bookstore's ownership was transferred to the International Society for Individual Liberty in November 2007...

, a libertarian book store. Schwartz argued that this activity violated the Objectivist moral principle of sanction. In other words, Kelley was implicitly conferring moral approval on the organization by appearing at an event that it sponsored. LFB, in turn, was morally objectionable because it promoted books, such as The Passion of Ayn Rand

The Passion of Ayn Rand

The Passion of Ayn Rand is a 1999 film directed by Christopher Menaul. It is based on the book of the same title by Barbara Branden...

, that Schwartz maintained were hostile and defamatory towards Ayn Rand and Objectivism. (Although Schwartz made no mention of it, Leonard Peikoff had signed copies of his book The Ominous Parallels at three LFB events in 1982. Peikoff subsequently broke all relations with LFB after being told that LFB offered anarchist literature.)

Kelley responded, in a paper titled "A Question of Sanction", by disputing Schwartz’s interpretation of the sanction principle in particular and moral principles in general. Subsequently, in an essay appearing in The Intellectual Activist, Peikoff endorsed Schwartz’s view and claimed that Kelley's arguments contradicted the fundamental principles of Objectivism. Peikoff maintained that many non-Objectivist systems of thought, such as Marxism, are based on "inherently dishonest ideas" whose advocacy must never be sanctioned. He attributed the fall of NBI and subsequent schisms not to "differences in regard to love affairs or political strategy or proselytizing techniques or anybody’s personality," but to a "fundamental and philosophical" cause: "if you grasp and accept the concept of 'objectivity,' in all its implications, then you accept Objectivism, you live by it and you revere Ayn Rand for defining it. If you fail fully to grasp and accept the concept, whether your failure is deliberate or otherwise, you eventually drift away from Ayn Rand’s orbit, or rewrite her viewpoint or turn openly into her enemy." Those who criticized his position were to make their exit: "if you agree with the Branden or Kelley viewpoint or anything resembling it—please drop out of our movement: drop Ayn Rand, leave Objectivism alone. We do not want you and Ayn Rand would not have wanted you [...]"

Kelley responded to the Peikoff-Schwartz critique in his monograph, Truth and Toleration, later updated as The Contested Legacy of Ayn Rand. He responded to his ostracism by founding the Institute for Objectivist Studies (later called The Objectivist Center, then The Atlas Society

The Atlas Society

The Atlas Society — of which The Objectivist Center is a part — is a research and advocacy organization promoting "a culture that affirms the core Objectivist values of reason, individualism, freedom, and achievement." It is part of the Objectivist movement that split off from the Ayn Rand...

) with the help of Ed Snider

Ed Snider

Edward M. Snider is the American Chairman of Comcast Spectacor, a Philadelphia-based sports and entertainment company that owns the Philadelphia Flyers of the NHL, the Wells Fargo Center, the Spectrum, the regional sports network Comcast SportsNet and Global Spectrum, an international facilities...

. Kelley was joined by Objectivist scholars George Walsh and Jim Lennox, as well as former Collective members Joan and Allan Blumenthal.

The Atlas Society and the Ayn Rand Institute

Kelley’s Institute for Objectivist Studies (IOS) began to publish material on Objectivism and host conferences for Rand scholars in 1990. IOS held a symposium on Chris Sciabarra's book, Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical

Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical

Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical is a 1995 book by Chris Matthew Sciabarra tracing the intellectual roots of 20th century Russian-American novelist and philosopher Ayn Rand and the philosophy she developed, Objectivism....

. IOS invited Nathaniel and Barbara Branden to participate in the institute’s activities, effectively bringing them back into the Objectivist movement. Each has continued to appear at TAS events.

In 1994, the Ayn Rand Institute (ARI) expanded its educational programs into the Objectivist Graduate Center (OGC), which held classes led by Leonard Peikoff and Harry Binswanger. The OGC expanded into the Objectivist Academic Center (OAC) in 2000, offering undergraduate and graduate courses on Objectivism, writing, history, the history of philosophy, and the history of science. Several OAC classes are now accredited. In 1991, Peikoff's book Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand

Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand

Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand is a 1991 book by philosopher Leonard Peikoff about the ideas of his mentor, Ayn Rand. Peikoff describes it as "the first comprehensive statement" of Rand's Objectivist philosophy. The book is based on a series of lecture courses that Peikoff first gave in...

was published. It was the first systematic presentation of Rand's philosophy to appear in print. 1996 saw a series of lectures on Objectivism by ARI intellectuals at Harvard

Harvard University

Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...

. ARI increased its notoriety by staging a protest against President Clinton’s volunteerism initiative in 1997. ARI gathered more attention for its activism on behalf of the family of Elian Gonzalez. 1998 saw the release of Academy Award nominated documentary, Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life. In 1999 the United States Postal Service released an Ayn Rand stamp.

In 2000, Yaron Brook

Yaron Brook

Yaron Brook is an intellectual and political activist, and is the current president and executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute, a non-profit organization in Irvine, California, whose mission is to promote the novels of Ayn Rand and her philosophy of Objectivism.-Early life in Israel:Brook...

 succeeded Michael Berliner as head of the ARI. The 2000s have seen the most rapid growth of the Objectivist movement since its birth in the late 1950s. Op-eds put out by ARI are published by hundreds of newspapers annually, and ARI intellectuals are frequent guests on radio networks such as Air America

Air America Radio

Air America was an American radio network specializing in progressive talk programming...

 and TV networks such as Fox News and CNBC

CNBC

CNBC is a satellite and cable television business news channel in the U.S., owned and operated by NBCUniversal. The network and its international spinoffs cover business headlines and provide live coverage of financial markets. The combined reach of CNBC and its siblings is 390 million viewers...

. ARI speakers give scores of lectures on college campuses each year, which are sponsored by the hundreds of Objectivist campus clubs around the country. There are many community groups dedicated to the study of Objectivism, as well as several on-line forums and social networks for fans of Rand's novels and philosophy (see links).

As of 2007, ARI has distributed over 700,000 free copies of Ayn Rand’s novels to high schools around the country. In 2005 ARI opened a branch in Canada, which distributes free books to Canadian schools. Independently of ARI's free books program, Rand's books sell over 500,000 copies per year. Total sales of her books since publication is over 24 million copies.

ARI intellectuals are frequently interviewed for their controversial positions, particularly on Islam and the war on terror. In 2006, ARI sponsored a conference on the war on terror. In addition to Objectivist speakers, mid-east scholars Daniel Pipes

Daniel Pipes

Daniel Pipes is an American historian, writer, and political commentator. He is the founder and director of the Middle East Forum and its Campus Watch project, and editor of its Middle East Quarterly journal...

 and Robert Spencer

Robert Spencer

Robert Bruce Spencer is an American author and blogger best known for critiques of Islam and research into Islamic terrorism and jihad. He has published ten books, including two New York Times bestsellers, and is a regular contributor to David Horowitz's FrontPage Magazine and Human Events...

 and Danish newspaper editor Flemming Rose

Flemming Rose

Flemming Rose is a Danish-Jewish journalist, author and cultural editor at the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. He was principally responsible for the publishing of the cartoons that initiated the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy.- Life :Rose has a major in Russian language and...

 gave lectures.

The 2000s also saw a change for the Atlas Society (TAS). David Kelley stepped down as executive director and was replaced by ex-Cato

Cato Institute

The Cato Institute is a libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Edward H. Crane, who remains president and CEO, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of the conglomerate Koch Industries, Inc., the largest privately held...

 scholar Ed Hudgins. The institute relocated to Washington D.C. and launched a new magazine, The New Individualist. TAS has recently attracted media attention following its participation in the 2007 Conservative Political Action Conference

Conservative Political Action Conference

The Conservative Political Action Conference is an annual political conference attended by conservative activists and elected officials from across the United States....

 - CPAC.

Objectivism in academia

Despite the fact that several members of the Collective were philosophy graduate students at NYU

New York University

New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...

, Objectivism did not begin to make serious inroads into academic philosophy until the 1980s. Rand herself had much disdain for modern academia, citing the poor state of American universities, particularly the humanities

Humanities

The humanities are academic disciplines that study the human condition, using methods that are primarily analytical, critical, or speculative, as distinguished from the mainly empirical approaches of the natural sciences....

, as the source of much of the country's problems, and Peikoff expressed similar sentiments in the early 1990s, declaring that his book on Objectivism was "written not for academics, but for human beings (including any academics who qualify)."Peikoff, Leonard (1993). Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand

Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand

Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand is a 1991 book by philosopher Leonard Peikoff about the ideas of his mentor, Ayn Rand. Peikoff describes it as "the first comprehensive statement" of Rand's Objectivist philosophy. The book is based on a series of lecture courses that Peikoff first gave in...

New York: Meridian, p. xiv ISBN 978-0-452-01101-4 The Ayn Rand Institute initially concentrated on promoting Objectivism independently of academia, supplying free books to high schools and universities, sponsoring essay contests for students and support programs for teachers and professors interested in studying and teaching Rand's ideas.

Some limited academic attention was given to Objectivism in the 1970s. In 1971, William F. O'Neill published With Charity toward None: An Analysis of Ayn Rand's Philosophy, in which he provides an academic discussion of Objectivism. Although he alleges flaws in Rand's thinking, he expresses admiration for her efforts, and particularly her ability to motivate readers to think about philosophical issues. There was occasional discussion of Rand in scholarly journals throughout the rest of the decade.

Thirteen years later, the second book-length academic study of Objectivism appeared. It was a collection of essays called The Philosophic Thought of Ayn Rand, edited by Douglas Den Uyl and Douglas Rasmussen. It was also the first book about Rand's thought to be published after her death. Den Uyl and Rasmussen made a specific effort to bring more serious scholarly attention to Objectivism by maintaining high scholarly standards for the essays in their book.

In 1987, noted Aristotle

Aristotle

Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...

 scholar and Rand student Allan Gotthelf

Allan Gotthelf

Allan Gotthelf is an American philosopher, and a recognized authority on the philosophies of both Aristotle and Ayn Rand.-Academic career:...

 co-founded the Ayn Rand Society (with George Walsh and David Kelley), which is affiliated with the American Philosophical Association

American Philosophical Association

The American Philosophical Association is the main professional organization for philosophers in the United States. Founded in 1900, its mission is to promote the exchange of ideas among philosophers, to encourage creative and scholarly activity in philosophy, to facilitate the professional work...

. Non-Objectivist participants have included Jaegwon Kim

Jaegwon Kim

Jaegwon Kim is a Korean American philosopher currently working at Brown University. He is best known for his work on mental causation and the mind-body problem. Key themes in his work include: a rejection of Cartesian metaphysics, the limitations of strict psychophysical identity, supervenience,...

 and Susan Haack

Susan Haack

Susan Haack is an English professor of philosophy and law at the University of Miami in the United States. She has written on logic, the philosophy of language, epistemology, and metaphysics. Her pragmatism follows that of Charles Sanders Peirce.-Career:Haack is a graduate of the University of...

.

In 1995, Chris Matthew Sciabarra

Chris Matthew Sciabarra

Chris Matthew Sciabarra is a Brooklyn, New York-based political theorist. He is the author of three scholarly books—Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical; Marx, Hayek, and Utopia; and Total Freedom: Toward a Dialectical Libertarianism—as well several shorter works...

 published Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical, an academic study of Rand's ideas and intellectual history. Rand bibliographer Mimi Reisel Gladstein

Mimi Reisel Gladstein

Mimi Reisel Gladstein is a professor of English and Theatre Arts at the University of Texas at El Paso. Her specialties include authors such as Ayn Rand and John Steinbeck, as well as women's studies, theatre arts and 18th-century British literature.-Life and scholarship:Gladstein was born in...

 called Sciabarra's work "a significant milestone in Rand studies." Three years later, Sciabarra declared a "renaissance" in the scholarship about Rand, noting that his book was only "one of fifteen book titles dealing with Rand that have been published since 1995, along with countless articles and other references to her work." However, he also noted that not all of the material carried "deep scholarly interest."

In 2001, John McCaskey founded the Anthem Foundation for Objectivist Scholarship, which sponsors the work of professors affiliated with the Ayn Rand Institute. As of 2007 there were 13 such fellowships for the study of Objectivism in universities in the U.S., including at the University of Pittsburgh

University of Pittsburgh

The University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...

 and the University of Texas, Austin. In 2006, the Anthem Foundation in conjunction with the University of Pittsburgh

University of Pittsburgh

The University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...

 hosted a conference on the philosophy of science called "Concepts and Objectivity: Knowledge, Science, and Values." Participants included Objectivists Onkar Ghate, Allan Gotthelf

Allan Gotthelf

Allan Gotthelf is an American philosopher, and a recognized authority on the philosophies of both Aristotle and Ayn Rand.-Academic career:...

, James G. Lennox, Harry Binswanger

Harry Binswanger

Harry Binswanger is an American philosopher and writer. He is an Objectivist and was a long-time associate of Ayn Rand, working with her on The Ayn Rand Lexicon. His doctoral dissertation, in the philosophy of biology, presented a new theory of the goal-directedness of living action, in opposition...

, and Tara Smith, as well as noted analytic philosophers David Sosa

David Sosa

David Sosa is an American philosopher. He received his undergraduate degree from Brown University and a doctorate in philosophy from Princeton University. His PhD dissertation, completed in 1996 under the supervision of Mark Johnston, was titled "Representing Thoughts and Language". Before moving...

, A.P. Martinich, and Peter Railton

Peter Railton

Peter Albert Railton is John Stephenson Perrin Professor of Philosophy at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He received his Ph.D. from Princeton in 1980. His research interests center on contemporary metaethics and normative ethics, as well as consequentialism...

. Over the past several years, other Objectivists, not all of whom are affiliated with ARI, have received support from the BB&T Charitable Foundation's program to support the study of capitalism.

In 2006, Cambridge University Press

Cambridge University Press

Cambridge University Press is the publishing business of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII in 1534, it is the world's oldest publishing house, and the second largest university press in the world...

 published Tara Smith’s book, Ayn Rand’s Normative Ethics: The Virtuous Egoist.

Since 1999 The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, edited by Stephen D. Cox

Stephen D. Cox

Stephen D. Cox is the editor of Liberty magazine, an American monthly libertarian and classical liberal review. He is also a professor of literature at the University of California, San Diego and author of several non-fiction books....

, Chris Matthew Sciabarra

Chris Matthew Sciabarra

Chris Matthew Sciabarra is a Brooklyn, New York-based political theorist. He is the author of three scholarly books—Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical; Marx, Hayek, and Utopia; and Total Freedom: Toward a Dialectical Libertarianism—as well several shorter works...

, and R.W. Bradford (until his death in 2005), has been published semi-annually as a "nonpartisan," scholarly forum for the discussion of Rand's work and its application to many fields. None of its editors has been aligned with the Ayn Rand Institute

Ayn Rand Institute

The Ayn Rand Institute: The Center for the Advancement of Objectivism is a 501 nonprofit think tank in Irvine, California that promotes Ayn Rand's philosophy, called Objectivism. It was established in 1985, three years after Rand's death, by Leonard Peikoff, Rand's legal heir...

, and no one affiliated with ARI has participated in its exchanges since 2002.

Student activism

Objectivism has remained popular on college campuses, with dozens of student groups dedicated to promoting and studying the philosophy of Objectivism spread across the U.S., Australia, Canada, Guatemala, Israel, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and Norway. These clubs often present speakers on controversial topics such as abortion, religion, and foreign policy, often allying with conservative (and sometimes liberal) organizations to organize their events. For example, the New York University

New York University

New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...

 Objectivism Club hosted a joint panel on the Muhammad cartoons that received nationwide coverage for NYU's censorship of the cartoons. There are several dozen speakers sponsored by the Ayn Rand Institute and other organizations who give nationwide tours each year speaking about Objectivism.

The Ayn Rand Institute

Ayn Rand Institute

The Ayn Rand Institute: The Center for the Advancement of Objectivism is a 501 nonprofit think tank in Irvine, California that promotes Ayn Rand's philosophy, called Objectivism. It was established in 1985, three years after Rand's death, by Leonard Peikoff, Rand's legal heir...

 has spent more than $5M on educational programs advancing Objectivism, including scholarships and clubs. These clubs often obtain educational materials and speakers from the ARI. There are also several conferences organized by various organizations, which draw several hundred attendees each summer and feature philosophy courses and presentations of new publications and research. A student-run magazine, The Undercurrent, is published for colleges around the United States.

Charges

Over the years, some critics have accused Rand of being a cult figure and the Objectivist movement of being a cult

Cult

The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices...

. The term 'Randroid' (a portmanteau of 'Rand' and 'android') has been used to evoke the image of "the Galt

John Galt

John Galt was a Scottish novelist, entrepreneur, and political and social commenter. Because he was the first novelist to deal with issues of the industrial revolution, he has been called the first political novelist in the English language.-Life:Born in Irvine, North Ayrshire, Scotland, Galt was...

-imitating robots produced by the cult."

Suggestions of cult-like behavior by Objectivists began during the NBI days. With growing media coverage, articles began appearing that referred to the "Cult of Ayn Rand" and compared her to various religious leaders. Terry Teachout

Terry Teachout

Terry Teachout is a critic, biographer and blogger. He is the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal, the chief culture critic of Commentary, and the author of "Sightings," a column about the arts in America that appears biweekly in the Friday Wall Street Journal...

 described NBI as "a quasi-cult which revolved around the adoration of Ayn Rand and her fictional heroes," one that "disintegrated" when Rand split with Nathaniel Branden. In 1968, psychologist Albert Ellis, in the wake of a public debate with Nathaniel Branden

Nathaniel Branden

Nathaniel Branden, né Nathan Blumenthal , is a psychotherapist and writer best known today for his work in the psychology of self-esteem from a humanistic perspective...

, published a book arguing that Objectivism was a religion, whose practices included "sexual Puritanism," "absolutism," "damning and condemning," and "deification" of Ayn Rand and her fictional heroes. In his memoirs, Nathaniel Branden said of the Collective and NBI that "there was a cultish aspect to our world […] We were a group organized around a charismatic leader, whose members judged one another's character chiefly by loyalty to that leader and her ideas."

In 1972, libertarian author Murray Rothbard

Murray Rothbard

Murray Newton Rothbard was an American author and economist of the Austrian School who helped define capitalist libertarianism and popularized a form of free-market anarchism he termed "anarcho-capitalism." Rothbard wrote over twenty books and is considered a centrally important figure in the...

 began privately circulating an essay on "The Sociology of the Ayn Rand Cult," in which he wrote:
Rothbard also wrote that "the guiding spirit of the Randian movement was not individual liberty ... but rather personal power for Ayn Rand and her leading disciples."

In the 1990s, Michael Shermer

Michael Shermer

Michael Brant Shermer is an American science writer, historian of science, founder of The Skeptics Society, and Editor in Chief of its magazine Skeptic, which is largely devoted to investigating pseudoscientific and supernatural claims. The Skeptics Society currently has over 55,000 members...

 argued that the Objectivist movement displayed characteristics of religious cults such as the veneration and inerrancy of the leader; hidden agendas; financial and/or sexual exploitation; and the beliefs that the movement provides absolute truth and absolute morality. Shermer maintained that certain aspects of Objectivist epistemology and ethics promoted cult-like behavior:
In 1999, Jeff Walker published The Ayn Rand Cult. In one passage, Walker compared Objectivism to the Dianetics

Dianetics

Dianetics is a set of ideas and practices regarding the metaphysical relationship between the mind and body that was invented by the science fiction author L. Ron Hubbard and is practiced by followers of Scientology...

 practices of Scientology

Scientology

Scientology is a body of beliefs and related practices created by science fiction and fantasy author L. Ron Hubbard , starting in 1952, as a successor to his earlier self-help system, Dianetics...

, which is considered by many to be a cult. Both, argues Walker, are totalist sets of beliefs that advocate "an ethics for the masses based on survival as a rational being." Walker continues, "Dianetics used reasoning somewhat similar to Rand's about the brain as a machine. ... Both have a higher mind reprogramming the rest of the mind." Walker further notes that both philosophies claim to be based on science and logic. Walker's book has drawn criticism from Rand scholars. Chris Matthew Sciabarra

Chris Matthew Sciabarra

Chris Matthew Sciabarra is a Brooklyn, New York-based political theorist. He is the author of three scholarly books—Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical; Marx, Hayek, and Utopia; and Total Freedom: Toward a Dialectical Libertarianism—as well several shorter works...

 criticized Walker’s objectivity and scholarship. Mimi Reisel Gladstein

Mimi Reisel Gladstein

Mimi Reisel Gladstein is a professor of English and Theatre Arts at the University of Texas at El Paso. Her specialties include authors such as Ayn Rand and John Steinbeck, as well as women's studies, theatre arts and 18th-century British literature.-Life and scholarship:Gladstein was born in...

 wrote that Walker's thesis is "questionable and often depends on innuendo, rather than logic." R. W. Bradford

R. W. Bradford

Raymond William Bradford was an American writer chiefly known for editing, publishing, and writing for the libertarian magazine Liberty....

 called it "merely annoying" for scholars.

The claims of cultism have continued in more recent years. In 2004, Thomas Szasz

Thomas Szasz

Thomas Stephen Szasz is a psychiatrist and academic. Since 1990 he has been Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry at the State University of New York Health Science Center in Syracuse, New York. He is a well-known social critic of the moral and scientific foundations of psychiatry, and of the social...

 wrote in support of Rothbard's 1972 essay, and in 2006, Albert Ellis published an updated edition of his 1968 book that included favorable references to Walker's.

Responses

Rand stated that "I am not a cult", and said in 1961 that she did not want "blind followers." In the wake of NBI's collapse, she declared that she did not even want an organized movement.

Jim Peron responded to Shermer, Rothbard and others with an argument that similarities to cults are superficial at best and charges of cultism directed at Objectivists are ad hominem

Ad hominem

An ad hominem , short for argumentum ad hominem, is an attempt to negate the truth of a claim by pointing out a negative characteristic or belief of the person supporting it...

 attacks. Objectivism, he said, lacks layers of initiation, a hierarchy, obligation, cost or physical coercion:
In 2001, Rand's long-time associate Mary Ann Sures remarked:
Meanwhile, Shermer, who considers himself an admirer of Ayn Rand, has tempered his judgment. Contrasting Leonard Peikoff's "heavy-hammer approach" with the "big-tent approach" of The Atlas Society

The Atlas Society

The Atlas Society — of which The Objectivist Center is a part — is a research and advocacy organization promoting "a culture that affirms the core Objectivist values of reason, individualism, freedom, and achievement." It is part of the Objectivist movement that split off from the Ayn Rand...

, Shermer told Ed Hudgins: "If we’re close enough on the same page about many things, I think it’s more useful to cut people some slack, rather than going after them on some smaller points. I don’t see the advantage of saying, 'You shouldn’t have liked that movie because ultimately, if you were an Objectivist, you wouldn’t have.' I guess it was those sorts of judgments made by some Objectiv[ists] that I objected to."

Wider influence

There are a number of writers who cannot be classified as "Objectivist," but who still exhibit a significant influence of Objectivism in their own work. Prominent among these is John Hospers

John Hospers

John Hospers was an American philosopher. In 1972 he was the first presidential candidate of the Libertarian Party, and the only minor party candidate to receive an electoral vote in the 1972 U.S. Presidential election....

, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, University of Southern California

University of Southern California

The University of Southern California is a private, not-for-profit, nonsectarian, research university located in Los Angeles, California, United States. USC was founded in 1880, making it California's oldest private research university...

, who credited Rand's political ideas as helping to shape his own, while in other areas sharp differences remained. Another is Murray Rothbard

Murray Rothbard

Murray Newton Rothbard was an American author and economist of the Austrian School who helped define capitalist libertarianism and popularized a form of free-market anarchism he termed "anarcho-capitalism." Rothbard wrote over twenty books and is considered a centrally important figure in the...

, who, like Rand, advocated volition, Aristotle

Aristotle

Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...

 and natural rights

Natural rights

Natural and legal rights are two types of rights theoretically distinct according to philosophers and political scientists. Natural rights are rights not contingent upon the laws, customs, or beliefs of any particular culture or government, and therefore universal and inalienable...

, but who also advocated anarchism

Anarchism

Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...

, which was anathema to Rand. Also in this category are journalist Edith Efron

Edith Efron

Edith Efron was American journalist and author.Graduating from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, where she studied under journalist John Chamberlain, her career began as a writer for the New York Times Magazine. In 1947, she married a Haitian businessman, with whom she had a...

, scientist Petr Beckmann

Petr Beckmann

Petr Beckmann was a statistician and physicist who became a well-known advocate of libertarianism and nuclear power...

, and author Charles Murray

Charles Murray (author)

Charles Alan Murray is an American libertarian political scientist, author, columnist, and pundit working as a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank in Washington, DC...

.

See also

• Bibliography for Ayn Rand and Objectivism
  Bibliography for Ayn Rand and Objectivism
  This is a bibliography for Ayn Rand and Objectivism. Objectivism is a philosophical system initially developed in the 20th century by Rand.- Works by Ayn Rand:The lists below provide information on Ayn Rand's major works and collections...
  
  
• Libertarianism
  Libertarianism
  Libertarianism, in the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view...
  
  
• Libertarianism and Objectivism
  Libertarianism and Objectivism
  Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism has been and continues to be a major influence towards the libertarian movement. Many libertarians justify their political views upon aspects of Objectivism...
  
  
• Neo-Objectivist
  Neo-Objectivist
  A Neo-Objectivist is someone who subscribes to views similar to those promoted in Objectivism and opposes one or more aspects of the philosophy. Prominent Neo-Objectivists include Petr Beckmann, Walter Block, Nathaniel Branden, Edith Efron, John Hospers, David Kelley, Roderick Long, Wendy McElroy,...
  
  
• Objectivism (Ayn Rand)
  Objectivism (Ayn Rand)
  Objectivism is a philosophy created by the Russian-American philosopher and novelist Ayn Rand . Objectivism holds that reality exists independent of consciousness, that human beings have direct contact with reality through sense perception, that one can attain objective knowledge from perception...
  
  

External links

• Ayn Rand Institute
• Capitalism
• Ayn Rand Society
• The Center for the Advancement of Capitalism
• ObjectivismOnline.Net
• The Atlas Society
• Nathaniel Branden's site
• Leonard Peikoff's site
• Barbara Branden's site