As Jason has already informed Catallaxy readers, the 2008 Mont Pelerin Society Essay Competition is on. The prizes are pretty good – trips to the Mont Pelerin Society meeting in Tokyo over September 7-12 this year, plus US$2,500 for first prize, $1,500 for second prize, and $1,000 for third prize.

Speakers at the conference include luminaries such as Gary Becker, James Heckman, and Vaclav Klaus. He’s not so famous, but I am also looking forward to hearing the prolific but consistently interesting Edward Glaeser (and of course I am also looking forward to my first trip to Japan).

To get there, you have be less than 35 years old and to write in 5,000 words maximum by 30 April your answer to:

In The Constitution of Liberty Hayek says that “we are probably only at the threshold of an age in which the technological possibilities of mind control are likely to grow rapidly and what may appear at first as innocuous or beneficial powers over the personality of the individual will be at the disposal of government. The greatest threats to human freedom probably still lie in the future.”

Has Hayek’s gloomy warning been borne out by events, or has technology become more a force for liberating people from government?