Lenore T. Ealy

Lenore T. Ealy is founder and president of The Philanthropic Enterprise, a U.S.-based research institute that advances the intellectual foundations of the free society by promoting multi-disciplinary study of the social institutions and processes that facilitate human cooperation and by fostering connections between sound theory and practice in philanthropy, public entrepreneurship, and policy development.

Ealy earned her Ph.D. in the history of moral and political thought from The Johns Hopkins University (Baltimore, Maryland). She also holds an M.A. in history from the University of Alabama and a B.S. in education from Auburn University. She has been an affiliated scholar of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, a senior fellow of The Sagamore Institute (Indianapolis, Indiana), and presently serves as Secretary/Executive Director of The Philadelphia Society.

She is co-editor of the book series “Polycentricity: Studies in Institutional Diversity and Voluntary Governance” (Rowman and Littlefield). She has co-edited three books, including Commerce and Community: Ecologies of Social Cooperation (2015); History, On Proper Principles: Essays in Honor of Forrest McDonald (2010); and Liberty and Learning: Milton Friedman’s Voucher Idea at 50 (2006). She was the founding editor of Conversations on Philanthropy: Emerging Questions in Liberality and Social Thought, a scholarly journal published from 2004-2014 (www.conversationsonphilanthropy.org).