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Liberalism's Last Man: Hayek in the Age of Political Capitalism
Current price:
$35.00
Publication Date: August 23rd, 2023
Publisher:
University of Chicago Press
ISBN:
9780226821474
Pages:
288
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Description
A modern reframing of Friedrich Hayek’s most famous work for the 21st century.
Friedrich Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom was both an intellectual milestone and a source of political division, spurring fiery debates around capitalism and its discontents. In the ensuing discord, Hayek’s true message was lost: liberalism is a thing to be protected above all else, and its alternatives are perilous.
In Liberalism’s Last Man, Vikash Yadav revives the core of Hayek’s famed work to map today’s primary political anxiety: the tenuous state of liberal meritocratic capitalism—particularly in North America, Europe, and Asia—in the face of strengthening political-capitalist powers like China, Vietnam, and Singapore. As open societies struggle to match the economic productivity of authoritarian-capitalist economies, the promises of a meritocracy fade; Yadav channels Hayek to articulate how liberalism’s moral backbone is its greatest defense against repressive social structures.
Praise for Liberalism's Last Man: Hayek in the Age of Political Capitalism
"Yadav debuts with a vigorous reappraisal of 20th-century economist Friedrich Hayek in light of todayʼs increasing authoritarian encroachment on liberal, meritocratic, free-market societies. . . . Seamlessly intertwining political philosophy, intellectual history, and textual criticism, this is an expansive and robust defense of capitalist liberalism."
— Publisher's Weekly
"Liberalism’s Last Man performs an exceptional service in recasting The Road to Serfdom in a form that modern readers may find easier to appreciate than the original work. For too long Hayek has been treated—by admirers and critics alike—as a slogan or a caricature rather than a serious thinker. It’s time for a comeback."
— The Wall Street Journal
"In Liberalism’s Last Man, Vikash Yadav argues that Hayek has been mischaracterized as an extreme libertarian and market fundamentalist. Yadav points out [Hayek's] support for several progressive positions, including the state’s provision of a minimum income, the promotion of social mobility, the taxation and regulation of pollution, and antitrust laws to restrain monopolies."
— The New York Review of Books
"Hayek is a complex figure. A careful analysis of his work is necessarily complex. Yadav provides clarity and understanding around this oft-misunderstood intellectual who is too important to misconstrue or misrepresent."
— Law & Liberty
"Does Hayek’s critique of socialism and defense of liberalism in his 1944 book The Road to Serfdom have any relevance for the very different challenges the international order faces today? Yadav’s ambitious goal is to answer that question via a close reading of Hayek’s classic text. The result is a penetrating, insightful, sometimes provocative and always stimulating performance."
— Bruce Caldwell | coauthor of "Hayek: A Life, 1899–1950" | Duke University
“Well-written, well-researched, and engrossing, the great accomplishment of Liberalism's Last Man is its engagement with modern political theory through the lens of Hayek. It’s a highly original work—and refreshing in that it takes Hayek’s critics seriously while also refraining from shortchanging Hayek for his supposed intellectual sins.”
— Peter Boettke | author of "F. A. Hayek: Economics, Political Economy and Social Philosophy"
