Arthur Brooks

If the right is to have a shot at steering American public policy, Arthur Brooks will be one of the architects of its vision. His conservatism stands for something more than tax cuts for the rich and ever-tighter ­restrictions on abortions. The New York Times’ David Brooks described it as “capitalism for the masses”: It includes a heavy emphasis on social entrepreneurship—leveraging business techniques to solve social problems. Not what you’d expect from a Seattle-born French-horn player.

—David Wessel, director of the Hutchins Center at the Brookings Institution