La Bocca: Your all Francis Fukuyama all the time blog!

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Well, at least for the next two weeks, as I frantically try to read his new 600 page book and write a review of it before November 11. As usual, I will be placing interesting quotes from and occasional remarks about the book here, in the process of collecting material for the review.

Here is one for my ancap friends: "The reason that [Africa] is so much poorer in terms of income, health, education and the like than booming regions like East Asia can be traced directly to its lack of strong government institutions." -- Political Order and Political Decay, p. 4

It suggests a new slogan for them: "Embrace anarcho-capitalism, and we, too, can be as poor as Africans!"


Comments

  1. A9:32 PM

    so-called 'anarcho-capitalism' isn't really anarchy. Nor is it non-existent government institutions. It's just a new, modern (or maybe post-modern) form of feudalism, in drag.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Bob Murphy9:57 PM

    But per the last quote, FF doesn't even know anarcho-capitalism exists. He apparently has never read a single writer advocating it.

    So I'm not taking his analysis of Africa that seriously. If I said, "No economist thinks government spending is good during a recession," my statement would be very compelling as a critique of Keynes.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. A12:08 AM

      I'm guessing you left out the 'not'.

      Delete
    2. Bob Murphy12:31 AM

      My comment would be more persuasive if I had not omitted the "not" in the final sentence...

      Delete
  3. Ken B10:00 PM

    Anarcho-capitalist commenter ignores the word "institutions" in 5, 4, 3, 2, ...

    ReplyDelete
  4. A12:16 AM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. gcallah7:26 AM

      Yes, I never bought that thesis either.

      Delete

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