具体描述
Liberty is hardly the "natural" order of things. In most places and at most times, the strong have dominated the weak and human freedom has been quashed by force or by customs and norms. Either states have been too weak to protect individuals from these threats or states have been too strong for people to protect themselves from despotism. Liberty emerges only when a delicate and precarious balance is struck between state and society.
There is a happy Western myth that political liberty is a durable construct, a steady state, arrived at by a process of "enlightenment." This static view is a fantasy, the authors argue; rather, the space to attain and maintain liberty stays open only via a fundamental and incessant struggle between state and society. The power of state institutions and the elites that control them has never gone uncontested in a free society. In fact, the capacity to contest them is the definition of liberty. State institutions have to evolve continuously as the nature of conflicts and needs of the society change, and thus society's ability to keep state and rulers accountable must intensify in tandem with the capabilities of the state. This struggle between state and society becomes self-reinforcing, inducing both to develop a richer array of capacities just to keep moving forward along the corridor. Yet this struggle also underscores the fragile nature of liberty. It is built on a delicate balance between state and society, between economic, political and social elites and citizens, between institutions and norms. One side of the balance gets too strong, and as it has often happened in history, liberty begins to wane. Liberty depends on the vigilant mobilization of society. But it also needs state institutions to continuously reinvent themselves in order to meet new economic and social challenges that can easily close the space liberty needs to survive.
Today we are in the midst of a time of wrenching destabilization. We need liberty more than ever, and yet the corridor to liberty is getting narrower and more treacherous. The danger on the horizon is not "just" the loss of our political freedom, however grim that is in itself; it is also to the prosperity and safety that critically depend on liberty. The opposite of the corridor of liberty is the road to ruin.
用户评价
##1）框架还是有新意的，强国家能力其实依赖于公民的信任和self compliance，最强的国家能力最往往和强社会制约能力共生（shackled Leviathan），纯专制国家的政府能力通常都较为有限（天朝可能是例外）。2）由于社会/国家力量初始条件不同，相同方向的冲击可能会走向不同的均衡路径。3）现代经济体系愈发需要强国家能力的支持，新的形势要求国家扩张干预时，需要能够结成广泛的社会联盟，既能制约监督扩大的利维坦，又能在不同利益群体间协商妥协。我感觉state-society contest model不足以装下解释政治发展路径的野心，把普通民众、经济精英、公民社会、宗族酋长种姓等传统社会力量都一股脑套为society过度简约了。另外中国的章节有不少小史实错误，读起来确实非常“外宾”。
##fine theory but bad impressionalistic empirics 关于中国的innovation, social credit system, ... 都先带结论 简单粗暴 其他章节的empirics估计也是同样的找写手或者RA填充的 令人失望
##感觉论据有些单薄，比较先入为主。
##感觉就是唰啦一把转了一遍地球仪，走马观花地看了看宏观的气象，没什么太记得住的东西。
##该书的有两点令人受益，一个是其分析问题的框架，第二个是对多个历史时期世界各个不同地方的国家社会的介绍。该书的结论在我看来还是自相矛盾，这也是价值观不同所无法调和分歧。
##啊……看不太下去了……典型的白人视角……吧？
##感觉论据有些单薄，比较先入为主。
##毛咕噜和罗宾逊新书，书肯定是好书，观点不新，但讲述的方式很有趣。因为某些你懂的原因，这本书估计很难引进过来😅
##没有中译，借标