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PDF » BOOK The End of History and the Last Man ☆ ❰Read❯ ➪ The End of History and the Last Man Author Francis Fukuyama – Horticulturetrader.co.uk Ever since its first publication in 1992 The End of History and the Last Man has provoked controversy and debate Francis Fukuyama's prescient analysis of religiousNt analysis of religious fundamentalism politics scientific progress ethical codes and war is as essential for a world fighting fundamental “But it is not necessarily the case that liberal democracy is the political system best suited to resolving social conflicts per se A democracy's ability to peacefully resolve conflicts is greatest when those conflicts arise between socalled interest groups that share a larger pre existing consensus on the basic values or rules of the game and when the conflicts are primarily economic in nature But there are other kinds of non economic conflicts that are far intractable having to do with issues like inherited social status and nationality that democracy is not particularly good at resolving” Francis Fukuyama was born on October 27 1952 to Yoshio Fukuyama a second generation Japanese American and Toshiko Kawata Fukuyama Fukuyama’s childhood years were spent in New York city and in 1967 the family moved to State College Pennsylvania where he then attended high school His Bachelor of Arts in Classics was obtained in 1974 from Cornell University and taught right after in the Yale University Department of Comparative Literature during 1974 – 1975 In 1981 he received his Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science from Harvard University by doing a dissertation on Soviet foreign policy Francis Fukuyama was a member of the Political Science Department of the RAND Corporation which conducts researches about public policies in Santa MonicaCalifornia from 1979 to 1980 1983 – 1989 and then in 1995 – 1996 In 1981 and 1982 Francis Fukuyama was an official member of the Policy Planning Staff of the United States Department of State where he focused on Middle Eastern issues In 1989 he returned to the same body but this time as a deputy director for European political and military affairs While he was a member of this said policy planning staff he published an essay entitled “The End of History?” in a small foreign policy journal named The National InterestThe End of History and the Last Man is a book expanding the essay “The End of History?” that Francis Fukuyama wrote in 1981 It sparked extraordinary debate both in the United States and abroad Francis Fukuyama’s analytical philosophy is anchored in the fact that the article was written five months before the collapse of the Berlin wall where ideological contentions between democracies and communism were in head to head disputation His employment at those times and his origin of education has surely predicated his preferences in writing the article and eventually the book Being a RAND corporation researcher and as a member of the United States Department Policy Planning Staff would have surely molded his very reasons for writing such As an officially employed citizen of the United States one cannot deny that fact that he must advocate to the principles of the State and government that has employed nurtured and protected him and that is liberal democracy We may say that because he is of the government he wrote the “End of History?” to impinge on disintegration of the Berlin wallThe End of History and the Last Man posits the idea of writing a universal history of human development with the end of liberal democracy The prevalent extension of not only liberal political but also economic ideas throughout the communist world and to third world countries presupposes that mankind has reached its ideological evolutionary process Although the occurrence of events in the simplistic sense of history still occurs the evolution of human society has reached its end with liberal democracy and not with communismFrancis Fukuyama points significant emphasis on the French and American Revolutions He stresses that the amalgamated ideals formed in the momentous revolutions were the indispensable foundations of the end of man’s history liberal democracy His periodization ends with all states having the same form of governmentIt rejects Marx’s idea of human development with communism as the end goals of the system And just as any post – modern theory rejects grand narratives in existenceso does it support and enact one of its own This is what Francis Fukuyama’s work is doing it rejects the various numerous ideas of the development of human society and presents that grand narrative that societal development ends with the institutionalization of liberal democracy in every statePerhaps the biggest critiue about Francis Fukuyama and his book The End of History and The Last man is that he has this tendency to show his biases on his writings His position in the government of the nation is clearly felt in the arguments of the origin of liberal democracy and the end of which he speaks of in essence perpetuates the imperialistic aims of a world super powerThis review has been cross posted at imbookedindefinitely

EPUB ô The End of History and the Last Man · Francis Fukuyama

Ever since its first publication in 1992 The End of History and the Last Man has provoked controversy and debate Francis Fukuyama's prescie I was thinking of reading one of the author’s recent works “On the Origins of Political Order” when I saw a comment from him about how that book was in part an attempt to update “The End of History” with what he knows about the world now As I’d never read “The End of History” I decided to start with that The book takes the reader back to those optimistic days of the early 90s when dictators of all stripes seemed to be on the run I’d be interested to read of the author’s recent thoughts although his thesis here contains enough caveats not to be disproved by the current state of the worldIt’s really beyond my ability to adeuately summarise Prof Fukuyama’s arguments but two themes stand out for me Firstly he argues that History the use of the capital letter is necessary to distinguish his term from the simple procession of events is not random but proceeds overall in a uniform direction towards an end state In this he shares an approach with Marx though of course the two came to different conclusions as to what the end of History might look like Secondly he suggests that we have tended to overestimate how much of History has been driven by the desire for material wealth He argues instead that History has been driven primarily by “the desire for recognition” This in effect comes down to concepts such as pride dignity self esteem etc or in a extreme form vainglory Prof Fukuyama divides the “desire for recognition” into two concepts “Isothymia” – the desire to be considered eual to others and “Megalothymia” the desire to be considered superior to others Megalothymia “can be manifest both in the tyrant who invades and enslaves a neighbouring people so that they will recognise his authority as well as in the concert pianist who wants to be recognised as the foremost interpreter of Beethoven”The author brings these two ideas together by arguing that liberal democracy whilst imperfect has proved itself superior to other forms of political organisation in the degree to which it meets “the desire for recognition” amongst humans Whilst those other forms – monarchy oligarchy fascism authoritarian nationalism communism theocracy still exist around the world these will gradually diminish and be replaced by liberal democracyProf Fukuyama does discuss threats to liberal democracy In this book he’s rather dismissive of nationalism describing it as a recent phenomenon that arose out the breakdown of the old class divisions and one that will fade over time even if it remains strong at present Since he wrote those words much of the world’s population has of course fallen under the sway of overtly nationalist politicians In the long run though he saw the biggest danger to democracy as coming from the inherent tension between the continued existence of a modified form of megalothymia alongside the commitment of liberalism to isothymia Democracy might be destroyed by an excess of either concept In that sense he retreats somewhat from his own thesis that liberal democracy represents “The End of History”I must say I enjoyed reading this It’s certainly not a uick read but it’s one that got me thinking Prof Fukuyama uotes a great deal from other philosophers particularly Hegel who seems to have been his inspiration I haven’t read much philosophy so many of the concepts he discussed were new to me I definitely intend to read some of the author’s recent books though I need a bit of a break before I do so

Francis Fukuyama · The End of History and the Last Man MOBI

The End of History and the Last ManIst terrorists as it was for the end of the Cold War Now updated with a new afterword The End of History and the Last Man is a modern class I first read this book when it came out in 1992 was impressed by it and kept it for a second read that I completed yesterdayMy first impression that this is a very important work has been confirmed not only did I find my original highlighting justified I added a bit The derision the book has received is not justified and is based on a superficial analysis of the author's ideaFukuyama takes as his theme the idea of GWF Hegel 1770 1831 that history is linear and has arrived at its destination This contrasts to the view that history is cyclical and that mankind can be put right back into earlier conditions through the loss of what we have at present The End of History is a very carefully and clearly written attempt to show that there is no going back and for entirely different reasons no further advance is possible We cannot go back for technological reasons; the knowledge we have of the physical world cannot be unlearned Though we will surely go forward technologically we cannot go forward to something new politically because the contradictions of political life that have driven mankind through different ideologies have reached a resolutionAs the author is careful to point out and as is obvious to anyone this doesn't mean that there will be no events taking place or that politics will end There can still be wars as we know and unforeseen things will happen that will fill the history books of the future But Hegel's idea of the dialectic that political progress takes place through thesis meeting antithesis then moving on to synthesis before a new contradiction in the synthesis sets up the cycle again has reached a conclusion in liberal democracy with its recognition of the human euality of all peopleAt long last mankind has reached the stage where there are no masters and subjects but eual citizens who can determine the course of their own lives free of the dictates of those who formerly would claim to be superior The history of kings tyrants and the concept of the ubermenchen of National Socialism is over The right to rule now comes in much of the world from freely held elections as such ideas as the divine right of kings have lost legitimacy due to their irrationality This is a key point that ideas driving ideologies have resulted through trial and failure in the coming of one idea that works with a method for resolving contradictions within it Even nationalism that we know so well is irrational in that it says one group of people is superior to another purely from living in one place and not another There is no longer any denying that one person is eually human with another regardless of labelsFukuyama devotes much attention to the concept of thymos as the ancient Greeks called spiritedness or the drive to power that propels those who dare to defy even death for the sake of achievement It is this fearlessness that throughout history has brought those who have it to a high degree he calls them megalogthymic to power over others because the individual will risk all beyond reason when others either fear for their safety and yield to him or are destroyed by him in competitionToday this drive for powersuperiority has been diverted into business One can be a megalomaniac in business without bringing war to society True the risk of life is not involved but the acuisition of many mansions and wives is far better than the destruction of armies the devastation of cities and the accompanying deaths of thousands for the will of one man as we saw with Hitler Fascism and communism were the last contenders and went down as proven failures Liberal democracy with capitalism has solved the problem of how to handle the human psyche but see below and as such is the destination of human historyCertainly there are many parts of the world where history continues with warlords fighting and no sign of liberal democracy yet the appeal of the latter is obvious and it gradually spreads though its association with capitalism As Fukuyama writes the jury is still out on whether a democracy is necessary for economic success think of how well China is doing but it is undeniable that democracy answers the need of every individual for recognitionThere is the big problem of the environment but nobody has anything else to suggest that might be superior to our current system in meeting the challenge There is the big problem of nuclear weapons but again nobody has proposed a way to get rid of them and they cannot be un invented We are condemned to live with them The modern world might well be destroyed as a result but a rebuilding would attempt to remake liberal democracy though anarchic times might be passed through first We see in the present a livable workable way of life that we would not consider giving up for anything that went before and with nothing better on offer putting us at the end of historyBut wait What of that megalothymic man? Is cutthroat business really a satisfying substitute for defying death? Consider all the people who deliberately court death for the feeling it gives the Evel Knievals of the world Think of the mass shooters that pop up almost weekly now Not only are these menboys courting death they bring it on themselves deliberately after carelessly taking many before them Could this be a symptom of people who do not fit into the end of history; are lost amid the material plenty in isolation and anomie? Would someone seriously consider bringing the whole house down on our society simply for the thrill to self it might bring and the hope that it would return us to the bloody battle of history? This is the uestion of the last man with which the book endsFrancis Fukuyama is a wonderful thinker and writes so clearly that I easily found myself lost in the book He covers much than I have mentioned here in particular the uestion of morals and relativism As we come to realize that we should accept all people as eually human and as we realize that people are animals and that animals share many things with us our concern broadens and our exclusivity dissolves How do we determine where lines are to be drawn? I have also left out his extensive discussion of Christianity as a foundation for the overthrow of the masterslave mentality The End of History and the Last Man is a fascinating read