4 ms·

sadly, his "end of history" thesis is turning out to be a replay of history that is the situation that preceded WWI, at an even more global scale. hopefully it

sadly, his "end of history" thesis is turning out to be a replay of history that is the situation that preceded WWI, at an even more global scale. hopefully it doesn't replay the great war too

pyuser583 5y ago
He’s done a lot of really good work since then. I recommend “Origins of Political Order.” He really has some fascinating ideas.
- thriftwy 5y ago
  But has he done an explicit post-mortem of his "end of history" idea which obviously went belly up? I agree that liberalism is a good thing, the only problem it's not me you need to convince, but Putin, Erdogan and Xi, and they obviously don't want to give their power like it would imply. What' even more concerning ia that nobody else seem to want it. It's not like people are lining to replace Putin, Xi or even Trump.
  - pyuser583 5y ago
    He’s done a number of post-mortems. Most recently, and probably most extensively, he addressed the topic in “After the End of History: Conversations with Francis Fukuyama”. His post-mortem analysis has changed over time - understandably so. A postmortem done in 2009 should be very different from one done in 2021.
  - medo-bear 5y ago
    > I agree that liberalism is a good thing, the only problem it's not me you need to convince, but Putin, Erdogan and Xi, and they obviously don't want to give their power like it would imply i think this line of reasoning is very wrong and in some sense insulting. i am sure you don't mean it like that, but i would say that if you need to convince someone of something like that, it is the people of those countries that you need to convince. also rejection of liberalism doesn't only happen in russia, china, and turkey. it is pervasive in central and eastern europe, in middle east, as well as in some huge populations like indonesia, and probably in a lot of other places too. pretty much it is possible that most of the world's population thinks it is not a good idea
    - thriftwy 5y ago
      If the people in e.g. Russia are mostly convinced, how would that happen? Putin is still going to win "elections". As Belarus example has shown, prolonged and violent protests will not help in the slightest but only cause backlash. Then liberalism loses due to being non productive - a theoretically good idea which does not have a path to implementation.
      - medo-bear 5y ago
        i think people in russia are largely sceptical of liberalism due to the huge mess it caused during the yeltsin years. yelsin, a hard core liberal, by the way ordered the army to shoot its tanks on the parliament in 1993 [0], and had the support of the liberal west to do it. today (and since the fall of ussr) the biggest opposition in russia comes from the communists [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Russian_constitutional_crisis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Russian_constitutional_...
        thriftwy 5y ago
        Even if people become largely sceptical of Putin, he's not going away unless he choses to. So, being sceptical* of Putin is another example of unproductive behavior; and prolonged unproductive behavior is a sign of mental illness according to DEG. * in any way that exhibits in your behavior
  - 1cvmask 5y ago
    Obama killed more people than all three of the names you cite. In fact he killed more than all the world leaders combined during his temure. In fact he was the first Nobel Peace Prize recipient to kill another recipient. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/doctors-without-borders-bombing_n_5615690ce4b021e856d33d51 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/doctors-without-borders-bombi... He killed american citizens without due process and get it a beatiful Orwellian name: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposition_Matrix https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposition_Matrix He even killed a 16 year old American: https://theintercept.com/2017/01/30/obama-killed-a-16-year-old-american-in-yemen-trump-just-killed-his-8-year-old-sister/ https://theintercept.com/2017/01/30/obama-killed-a-16-year-o... Obama created the world’s largest surveillance state. He illegally spied on US citizens and his administration constantly lied to Congress about in testimony under oath. He put kids in cages. He deported more people than all American Presidents ever. He did not fire anyone who tortured people. He kept Guantanamo bay open. The worlds largest prison population (aka forced prison labor or concentration camp) increased under his tenure. He illegally spied on members of Congress and the opposition. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2014/07/31/336855226/cia-chief-apologizes-sens-feinstein-chambliss-over-computer-intrusion https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2014/07/31/336855226... So is that good leadership to you?
    - eynsham 5y ago
      Lots of these specific claims are correct, though I’m not really sure how you get > Obama killed more people than all three of the names you cite and indeed that’s sufficiently vague and open to quibbling that I’m not surprised you give a source (and the truth of this would likely be resolved on dubious definitional grounds rather than anything more generally meaningful). I suppose the other question is this: what relation does this have to the parent comment? Of course Obama is I suppose a fairly good example of a liberal, but he’s not the only one, and it’s quite plausible that he did these things qua president of the American Empire (not a ‘liberal’ position) rather than qua a liberal; compare, say, Icelandic or Zambian liberalism, which, not being attached to great imperial apparatuses, don’t tend to do this sort of thing.
  - eunos 5y ago
    > liberalism is a good thing Liberalism can be a good thing, yet the zeal of its practitioners espousing something in tune of "Outside Liberalism theres no salvation" might not be good.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > It's not like people are lining to replace Putin, Xi or even Trump. People were, in fact, lining up to replace Trump. And one did. Rapid transition from antiliberal to liberal regimes (rather from illiberal leaders within a basically liberal system) is a hard problem; the elements of liberal regimes evolved slowly through class power politics, mostly long before liberal philosophy rationalized them, and otherwise have spread mostly slowly by contact, though occasionally rapidly through conquest and deliberate social reengineering by rhe conqueror. But even then, its usually a rapid burst after a long infiltration, not a 0-60 rush.
  - tarboreus 5y ago
    Also, read the book instead of responding to the title. If you want a response to the idea of the end of history, read the end of The End of History.

sadly, his "end of history" thesis is turning out to be a replay of history that is the situation that preceded WWI, at an even more global scale. hopefully it doesn't replay the great war too

pyuser583 5y ago

He’s done a lot of really good work since then. I recommend “Origins of Political Order.” He really has some fascinating ideas.

thriftwy 5y ago
But has he done an explicit post-mortem of his "end of history" idea which obviously went belly up? I agree that liberalism is a good thing, the only problem it's not me you need to convince, but Putin, Erdogan and Xi, and they obviously don't want to give their power like it would imply. What' even more concerning ia that nobody else seem to want it. It's not like people are lining to replace Putin, Xi or even Trump.
- pyuser583 5y ago
  He’s done a number of post-mortems. Most recently, and probably most extensively, he addressed the topic in “After the End of History: Conversations with Francis Fukuyama”. His post-mortem analysis has changed over time - understandably so. A postmortem done in 2009 should be very different from one done in 2021.
- medo-bear 5y ago
  > I agree that liberalism is a good thing, the only problem it's not me you need to convince, but Putin, Erdogan and Xi, and they obviously don't want to give their power like it would imply i think this line of reasoning is very wrong and in some sense insulting. i am sure you don't mean it like that, but i would say that if you need to convince someone of something like that, it is the people of those countries that you need to convince. also rejection of liberalism doesn't only happen in russia, china, and turkey. it is pervasive in central and eastern europe, in middle east, as well as in some huge populations like indonesia, and probably in a lot of other places too. pretty much it is possible that most of the world's population thinks it is not a good idea
  - thriftwy 5y ago
    If the people in e.g. Russia are mostly convinced, how would that happen? Putin is still going to win "elections". As Belarus example has shown, prolonged and violent protests will not help in the slightest but only cause backlash. Then liberalism loses due to being non productive - a theoretically good idea which does not have a path to implementation.
    - medo-bear 5y ago
      i think people in russia are largely sceptical of liberalism due to the huge mess it caused during the yeltsin years. yelsin, a hard core liberal, by the way ordered the army to shoot its tanks on the parliament in 1993 [0], and had the support of the liberal west to do it. today (and since the fall of ussr) the biggest opposition in russia comes from the communists [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Russian_constitutional_crisis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Russian_constitutional_...
      - thriftwy 5y ago
        Even if people become largely sceptical of Putin, he's not going away unless he choses to. So, being sceptical* of Putin is another example of unproductive behavior; and prolonged unproductive behavior is a sign of mental illness according to DEG. * in any way that exhibits in your behavior
- 1cvmask 5y ago
  Obama killed more people than all three of the names you cite. In fact he killed more than all the world leaders combined during his temure. In fact he was the first Nobel Peace Prize recipient to kill another recipient. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/doctors-without-borders-bombing_n_5615690ce4b021e856d33d51 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/doctors-without-borders-bombi... He killed american citizens without due process and get it a beatiful Orwellian name: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposition_Matrix https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposition_Matrix He even killed a 16 year old American: https://theintercept.com/2017/01/30/obama-killed-a-16-year-old-american-in-yemen-trump-just-killed-his-8-year-old-sister/ https://theintercept.com/2017/01/30/obama-killed-a-16-year-o... Obama created the world’s largest surveillance state. He illegally spied on US citizens and his administration constantly lied to Congress about in testimony under oath. He put kids in cages. He deported more people than all American Presidents ever. He did not fire anyone who tortured people. He kept Guantanamo bay open. The worlds largest prison population (aka forced prison labor or concentration camp) increased under his tenure. He illegally spied on members of Congress and the opposition. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2014/07/31/336855226/cia-chief-apologizes-sens-feinstein-chambliss-over-computer-intrusion https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2014/07/31/336855226... So is that good leadership to you?
  - eynsham 5y ago
    Lots of these specific claims are correct, though I’m not really sure how you get > Obama killed more people than all three of the names you cite and indeed that’s sufficiently vague and open to quibbling that I’m not surprised you give a source (and the truth of this would likely be resolved on dubious definitional grounds rather than anything more generally meaningful). I suppose the other question is this: what relation does this have to the parent comment? Of course Obama is I suppose a fairly good example of a liberal, but he’s not the only one, and it’s quite plausible that he did these things qua president of the American Empire (not a ‘liberal’ position) rather than qua a liberal; compare, say, Icelandic or Zambian liberalism, which, not being attached to great imperial apparatuses, don’t tend to do this sort of thing.
- eunos 5y ago
  > liberalism is a good thing Liberalism can be a good thing, yet the zeal of its practitioners espousing something in tune of "Outside Liberalism theres no salvation" might not be good.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > It's not like people are lining to replace Putin, Xi or even Trump. People were, in fact, lining up to replace Trump. And one did. Rapid transition from antiliberal to liberal regimes (rather from illiberal leaders within a basically liberal system) is a hard problem; the elements of liberal regimes evolved slowly through class power politics, mostly long before liberal philosophy rationalized them, and otherwise have spread mostly slowly by contact, though occasionally rapidly through conquest and deliberate social reengineering by rhe conqueror. But even then, its usually a rapid burst after a long infiltration, not a 0-60 rush.
- tarboreus 5y ago
  Also, read the book instead of responding to the title. If you want a response to the idea of the end of history, read the end of The End of History.