Casey Given's Mercatus Fellowship Story
Building the Next Generation of Classical Liberal Communicators: How the Frédéric Bastiat Fellowship Helped Casey Given Launch Young Voices
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hen Casey Given applied to the inaugural class of the Frédéric Bastiat Fellowship in 2014, he was working at Americans for Prosperity, pursuing a master's degree part-time, and running Young Voices as a small editorial project within Students for Liberty. "I was really excited about it," he recalls. The fellowship arrived at a formative moment offering concrete, policy-focused discussions that would shape how he thought about tech policy, government mechanisms, and building narratives around scholarship. Today, as Executive Director of Young Voices now an independent nonprofit reaching over 90 million people annually with classical liberal ideas, Casey credits those early Bastiat experiences with teaching him how to weave policy narratives and connect with a network that has sustained his work for a decade.
It was something I really looked forward to. [...] We all got along quite well. Even to this day, a lot of people I still keep in touch with.
The Frédéric Bastiat Fellowship is a one-year program that brings together graduate students from different universities and disciplines, including economics, law, political science, and public policy. Through collaborative discussions with peers and Mercatus scholars, fellows explore how the Austrian, Virginia, and Bloomington schools of political economy provide foundations for contemporary policy analysis and apply to real-world challenges.
"It was wonderful" Casey says of those first sessions. "It was something I really looked forward to." The inaugural cohort was small only about 20 people creating a tight-knit group. "We all got along quite well. Even to this day, a lot of people I still keep in touch with." What distinguished Bastiat from other programs Casey had experienced was its concrete focus. "I really liked the fact that the Bastiat discussions were very concrete and policy focused."
I remember [...] how much I enjoyed the regulatory discussions. [...] That got me thinking more about Congress and broadly what's broken about the federal government. So that's an interest I still have a lot of reading on today.
Going in, Casey focused primarily on tech and education policy. The fellowship expanded his interests significantly. "What I gained more of an appreciation for and interest for is the mechanisms of the government," he explains. "I remember being surprised by how much I enjoyed the regulatory discussions. Like I remember there was one we had on OIRA (Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs)" That session, featuring a former OIRA director, opened his eyes to aspects of federal government functioning he hadn't considered. "That got me thinking more about Congress and broadly what's broken about the federal government. So that's an interest I still have a lot of reading on today."
But perhaps the most significant impact came from the network itself. The Friday night dinners before colloquia sessions built genuine friendships. "That's really how we got to know each other so well," Casey notes. Professionally, those connections have sustained Young Voices' growth. "We've had a number of Mercatus participants become Mercatus fellows, our employees, and vice versa Mercatus fellows go through Young Voices." The partnership has enriched both organizations.
Today, Young Voices has grown from a small editorial project to an independent organization generating over 2,000 media hits annually in outlets like the Wall Street Journal, BBC, Fox News, and CNN. The organization has expanded into Europe with 25 writers and launched the Dissident Project, connecting immigrants who escaped tyranny with high schools. Casey sees Young Voices creating "the next generation of secondhand dealers in ideas for liberty" a mission directly aligned with what he learned through Bastiat about translating scholarship for broader audiences.
Utilize the network as much as you can. [...] I think the fact that I was kind of a social butterfly really paid off.
To current and future Bastiat fellows, Casey offers straightforward advice: "Utilize the network as much as you can in terms of socializing, making those friendships. I think the fact that I was kind of a social butterfly really paid off in my early twenties." He also encourages academic-minded fellows to take seriously the opportunity to collaborate with Mercatus scholars. "If you're interested in any of these topics, you can potentially at the very least get mentorship, but you can potentially co-write a paper with a Mercatus scholar."
Casey's journey demonstrates how the Frédéric Bastiat Fellowship equips policy entrepreneurs with more than just knowledge; it provides the narratives, networks, and concrete policy focus needed to build organizations that advance classical liberal ideas to millions.