Portrait of Matt Ridley
Right · Thinker or writer · Active today

Matt Ridley

British science writer and businessman

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A member of the House of Lords whose book The Rational Optimist argues that trade and innovation improve lives, and who is skeptical of aggressive climate policy.

Matt Ridley sits in the right-libertarian part of the Caucus economy and liberty compass: strongly free market and leaning libertarian. The clearest positions are strongly growth-first on environment, strongly tech-optimist on technology and strongly free market on economy. The profile is close to the middle on culture.

Read more about Matt Ridley on Wikipedia →

Where Matt Ridley sits on ten dimensions

Each scale runs from one pole to the other, and the dot shows the overall tendency of this person's record and public life. These are simplified estimates and open to debate.

💰EconomyStrongly free market
State-ledFree market
⚖️Liberty and authorityLeaning libertarian
LibertarianAuthoritarian
🎭CultureCentered on culture
ProgressiveTraditional
🌍NationSlightly globalist
GlobalistNationalist
🌱EnvironmentStrongly growth-first
Growth-firstNature-first
🤖TechnologyStrongly tech-optimist
Tech-cautiousTech-optimist
🕊️War and peaceSlightly peace-first
Peace-firstStrength-first
🏛️InstitutionsLeaning anti-establishment
Anti-establishmentInstitutional
🙏ReligionLeaning secular
SecularReligious
🛡️InterventionismSlightly non-interventionist
Non-interventionistInterventionist

People most like Matt Ridley

Julian Simon American economist, 1932 to 199899%Michael Shellenberger American writer and activist99%Ludwig von Mises Austrian economist, 1881 to 197397%Milton Friedman American economist, 1912 to 200696%Friedrich Hayek Austrian-British economist and philosopher, 1899 to 199296%Marc Andreessen Venture capitalist and Netscape co-founder95%Peter Diamandis American entrepreneur and futurist95%Mario Vargas Llosa Peruvian novelist, 1936 to 202593%

People furthest from Matt Ridley

Mojtaba Khamenei Supreme Leader of Iran, 2026 to present9%Joseph de Maistre Savoyard counter-revolutionary thinker, 1753 to 182111%Ruhollah Khomeini Supreme Leader of Iran, 1979 to 198912%Louis XIV King of France, 1643 to 171512%

Political views closest to Matt Ridley

Techno-libertarianismBelieves that digital technology, encryption and open markets can shrink the state and…97%MinarchismLimits the state to a minimal "night-watchman" role of courts, police and defense.96%Effective accelerationismArgues that rapid technological progress, especially in AI and energy, is the best path…96%Austrian schoolAn economic tradition that stresses individual choice, sound money and skepticism about…95%

Read more about Matt Ridley

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Biographies of Matt RidleyBooks on techno-libertarianism

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Percentages show how close two profiles are across all ten dimensions. Including a person here is for study and comparison, not approval. Portrait: Chris McAndrew, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons; see all photo credits.