"Ludwig von Mises was one of the most influential economists of the twentieth century, and almost certainly the most significant free-market economist. Mises played a major role in the development of the Austrian School of economics, whose exponents - including Nobel laureates like F. A. Hayek, Milton Freidman, and Gary Becker - radically transformed the "dismal science." In this volume, Israel Kirzner follows Mises from his famous Privatseminar in Vienna - which included luminaries such as Hayek and Eric Voegelin - to his reluctant emigration from Geneva and his last years at New York University. Kirzner illuminates the sources and forces behind Mises' intellectual development. In so doing, he provides a useful and understandable overview of the principles of Austrian economics and the laissezfaire economic policies that became associated with it."--BOOK JACKET.