Guanajuato, Gto. July 11, 2016.- With the presentation of the Index of Economic Freedom for North America, concluded the activities of the Summer School Liberty and Development 2016, which occurred from July 5th to 9th at the University of Guanajuato (UG), organized by Liberty and Development.

This initiative came from the Department of Economy and Finance and the Department of Political and Government Studies from UG to divulge the economic culture and the beginnings of an open society.

The Index of Economic Freedom for North America 2015 was exposed thanks to the host Naumann Foundation for Freedom with the collaboration of Paths of Freedom (Mexico) and Fraser Institute (Canada).

The event was presided by Dr. Javier Corona Fernández, Rector of Campus Guanajuato, who congratulated the organizers and celebrated that in this Summer School edition, had chosen as a main topic the fundamental role of the scientific culture and human studies in college education as a necessary condition for a free society.

Dr. Corona affirmed that reflecting on education as a finality itself seems to go against the modern rational society who privileges the instrumentality of knowledge and tends to the reification of the human, hence, the need to urgently recognize that the education, the knowledge and philosophy, as means themselves, are part of the scientific and humanistic paradigm that University chases. He also affirmed that the index will be very useful for own planning done at UG and to even open research lines.

On her part, Birgit Lamm, Regional Director for Latin America of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom, thanked the University of Guanajuato for the hospitality and spoke about the Index of Economic Freedom for North America as a valuable instrument, but still perfectible, since the institutional weakness that prevails in some regions in Mexico, still makes difficult to gather reliable data in certain areas; however, she recognized the search and compilation made by Mexican researchers for a better national diagnosis that allowed, as a consequence, the comparison between the countries in North America.

José Torra, chief of research of Paths of Freedom, was responsible for presenting the index, which, among other data, gave the results that the province of Alberta, Canada has the highest range of economic freedom in North America. The Mexican states that were best valued are Jalisco, Baja California and Coahuila (with a 6.5 grade in a scale of 10); Guanajuato obtained the fourth place thanks to the work done in economic matter in the state.

At the presidium were present Dr. J. Refugio Vallejo Gutiérrez, director of the Department of Economy and Finance, representing Dr. Claudia Susana Gómez López, director of the Division of Economic-Administrative Sciences; Dr. Teresita de Jesús Rendón Huerta, director of the Division of Law, Politics and Government, and Dr. Carlos Román Cordourier Real, director of the Department of Political Studies.