Rating: 
Summary: Very good, although...
Review: An excellent book, although I find his arguments about monarchy unconvincing. There are many books other than this one that contain good critiques of Democracy. I would have liked to hear more convincing ideas about an alternative. I would recommend an older book "The Crowd" by Gustave Le Bon for a less academic, yet more convincing critique of Democracy.
Rating: 
Summary: This Tedium is Endless.....
Review: Could it truly be one of life's funny little ironies that but for these statist systems we would not be afforded the opportunity of reading these types of interesting philosophical offerings of the author and others? No doubt they would be too busy defending their private property fiefs from the next gang of enlightened "anarcho-capitalists" over the hill,to have much time to devote to the flights of fancy represented here. It all sounds good: "everyone his own bricklayer", and all that, and who can argue with individual freedom? On the other hand, we live in the world, not Eden, and we had all better make the best of it.As a realist,sadly,I think that means trying as best we can to make our collective and cooperative systems effective. Anything else is interesting, but ultimately unworkable.
Rating: 
Summary: A path-breaking work on the roots of civilization
Review: Democracy - The God That Failed is The Book for all friends of liberty and civilization. Professor Hans-Hermann Hoppe is a philosopher-economist, specialized in the economics of Ludwig von Mises and the Austrian school, and he does a path-breaking job in extending those ideas into political theory and history. The book is shock-therapy to those believing in democracy and all it represents.In only 200 pages Professor Hoppe makes a thorough revision of the history of Western civilization, refuting the statist and centralist fallacies and providing the reader with a substantiated and logical understanding of the role of traditional values and private property rights in the progress of history. He shows how democracy promotes parasitic behavior, short-sightedness and irresponsibility. Instead of being a sign of progress, democracy is an institution inherently destructive of civilization and prosperity. After reading the book, any reader will have abandoned his centralist-democratic political fallacies as well as the false ideal of human 'equality'. Instead, he will understand that all civilization is essentially based on the recognition of private property rights which, taken to its logical conclusion, leads into peaceful, prospering and cultivated societies of private property owners - in a word, a natural order. The book's only weakness is that it ends too soon! We can only hope that it will inspire young historians in writing thorough, large-scale revisions of world history from the propertarian, natural order point of view of Professor Hans-Hermann Hoppe.
Rating:
Summary: The New Anarcho-Capitalist Masterpiece
Review: Democracy: The God That Failed shows such clarity of thought that it is depressing to think that these ideas are on the fringe. In under 300 pages, Hans-Hermann Hoppe outlines a system of thought that provides meaning to history and sense to the world we live in. In the first 2 chapters, Hoppe writes the clearest explanation for the Austrian theory of time preference that I've ever read. In the next few chapters, he takes this economic theory and shows how recent world history should have been entirely predictable. By the time we're done, Hoppe has torn down any justification for the existence of the state, and explained how successful a stateless society can be. Hoppe's explanation of how the most basic government service, protection, is better provided privately, is more compelling than anything I've read by Rothbard or Friedman. This book, more than any of its predecesors, will win converts to the worldview of a stateless society. A genuine masterpiece.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating
Review: Dr. Hans-Herman Hoppe is a professor of economics and fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute. It is obvious from reading this work that his primary intellectual debt is to Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard. Prof. Hoppe, following Rothbard, advocates anarcho-capitalism, or, as he calls it, "natural order." He is not a monarchist, but shows the many advantages of monarchy over democracy. As Prof. Hoppe tells us, both Rothbard and von Mises, although by no means supporting most of the changes in the twentieth century, held a generally favorable opinion of the change from monarchy to democracy. However, Prof. Hoppe shows that this transition was not at all favorable to the protection of civil rights and restricting the growth of government. In fact, just the opposite happened. Contemporaneous with this change, we have seen a decline in morals and individual responsibility. This is largely explained by Prof. Hoppe's fascinating discussion of time preference to democratic and monarchical governments. A monarchical government is more likely to enact policies similar to what an individual, unfettered by government, would do. Take for example immigration. A monarch, who in some sense "owns" the country, will establish an immigration policy that reflects his country's need for new citizens. He will ask what the immigrant can contribute to the economy, whether the person has good values, and whether he is likely to become a public charge. The democratic government will permit massive immigration, more concerned with social engineering and expanding the pool of voters who will support the welfare state. He also shows that, contrary to many supposed conservatives and libertarians, "free trade" doesn't required "free immigration." This is one of the most interesting books I've read in a while. It's hard to summarize all the valuable insights of Prof. Hoppe. In particular, his demonstration that a libertarian philosophy is most conducive to traditional morality was quite persuasive. I didn't completely agree with his attack on Patrick Buchanan and Samuel Francis, which I think exaggerated some of the least libertarian aspects of their thought.
Rating:
Summary: down with democracy.
Review: Hans-Hermann Hoppe is a very important political economist and philosopher in the intellectual tradition of the Austrian School of Economics -- I would say he is without a doubt the most important anarchocapitalist thinker since Murray Rothbard. His book, _Democracy: The God That Failed_, is the most devastating and solid critique of democracy I have seen, and is essential reading for everyone in our new millennium. Democracy is conventionally regarded as the best form of government. Even most rigorous anti-statists such as Murray Rothbard (to whom Hoppe is intellectually indebted) looked upon democracy as an improvement over alternative systems of government. Professor Hoppe dissents with this view, averring that monarchy (ancien-regime-style) is a 'better' system than democracy. However, this is _not_ a defense of monarchy, for Hoppe sees any form of state as morally unjustifiable. Rather, _Democracy: The God That Failed_ serves a twin purpose: firstly, to interpret history and account for the dramatic rise in exploitation observed in the democratic age. Secondly, Hoppe asserts the moral and economic superiority of a system he calls "natural order" -- a stateless society of private property anarchy. By what insight does Hoppe show that monarchy is the superior system? It is shockingly brilliant in its simplicity, yet the implications that follow are critical. What Hoppe states is this: A monarch is essentially the _private_ owner of the government -- all exploited resources are *owned* by him. (Perhaps the insightful reader will already be able to predict Hoppe's conclusion.) As such, he will work to maximize both current income and the total capital value of his estate. In effect, he owns the kingdom. Thus, assuming self-interest, his planning horizon will be farsighted and exploitation be far more limited. Contrarily, in a publicly-owned government -- i.e. democracy -- the rulers' have current use of resources only, not their capital value. These government caretakers cannot personally keep that which is exploited from the tax-producers. Thus, systematic property violations will be greater under a democracy. In economic jargon, the monarch's degree of time-preference will be substantially lower than that of the publicly-owned government caretaker due to difference in ownership. But isn't the democratic system kept in check by elections? Not really, argues Hoppe, as those in power "buy" votes with their redistribution policies and egalitarian schemes. (Just like Alberta's current premiere buys votes with oil rebate checks, psh.) With these propositions, Hoppe examines issues the varying impact of monarchies and democracies on time preference (the rate at which present satisfaction is preferred to future satisfaction) (Chapter 1), differing policies on immigration (Chapters 7 and 8), differences in degree of exploitation (Chapter 2) the economics of redistribution (Chapter 4). He also makes the positive case for a natural order in the private production of security (Chapter 12), explains the erroneous classical liberal belief in the possibility of a limited government (Chapters 11 and 13), explores methods of desocialization of public property (Chapter 6), argues for the right to secession (Chapter 5) and myriad other important things. One crucial chapter is "On Conservatism and Libertarianism" (Chapter 10), where Hoppe demonstrates that libertarians and conservatives are natural allies in their goals, thus libertarians must be social conservatives and conservatives must be anti-state libertarians. Their goals can only be realized in alliance against all opponents to private property rights, as well as the false libertarians (modal libertarians) and socialist conservatives and neoconservatives. In response to roGER's asinine review (I won't even comment on his blatant post hoc, ergo propter hoc fallacy about democracies and their GDPs), it is obvious that he simply does not understand what Professor Hoppe has done here. Firstly, this is not a defense of monarchy. Secondly, in order to correctly interpret history, Professor Hoppe's analysis of monarchical and democratic systems is rooted in social science theories that are established a priori. Thus it is important to recognize that his argument cannot be proven or refuted on empirical grounds. However, this does not detract from the power of his argument -- quite the contrary, it makes the position in _Democracy: The God That Failed_ even more convincing. In conclusion, Natural Order > Monarchy > Democracy. This book is in my opinion extremely important, not just to economists, historians, and defenders of liberty, but anyone really. A bonus is that Hoppe's prose is compact yet lucid, so it's not inaccessible to the average reader.
Rating:
Summary: The New Anarcho-Capitalist Masterpiece
Review: Hoppe's introduction alone is worth the price of the book. And it is crucial to read the introduction before starting the book. He explains a priori knowledge ("propositions which assert something about reality and can be validated independent of the outcome of any future experience") in a simple, straightforward manner providing many examples. I stress this because although the Austrian Economists, which includes Hoppe, regularly mention a priori knowledge/theory - some of which is more commonly known as human nature - this is the first time I've seen it explained in such a clear and concise manner. Hoppe also defines what a monopoly is and stresses that all governments are monopolies and must result in declining product quality at steadily increasing prices for any activity they are engaged in. And, of course, the reason monopolies always behave this way is explained by a priori theory. Another significant point the author makes in the introduction is the inability of most historians to logically interpret, or choose between competing interpretations, the facts they so meticulously gather. As Hoppe states, "The principle advantage that the political economist and philosopher has over the mere historian (and the benefits to be gained from the study of political economy and philosophy by the historian) is his knowledge of pure - a priori - social theory, which enables him to avoid otherwise unavoidable errors in the interpretation of sequences of complex historical data and present a theoretically corrected or "reconstructed," and a decidedly critical or "revisionist" account of history". Needless to say, a priori theory threads it way through the remainder of the book, which, by the way, is useful and enlightening itself. My favorite chapters were one, seven, eight, and ten. Chapter one deals with time preference and how that determines whether society is moving in the direction of increasing civilization through savings and investment (low time preference) or its opposite, decivilization (high time preference). Hoppe shows how government is the biggest contributor to high time preference. In chapters seven and eight the author discusses the merits and demerits of free or restricted immigration. Hoppe's arguments have encouraged me to rethink my position on this issue, which had been to support free and open immigration for all. He also discusses forced integration and free trade. His arguments favoring free trade are, in my view, simply unchallengeable. Chapter ten deals with conservatism and libertarianism. Hoppe and Rothbard's descriptions of "modal" libertarians are right on the money. As a former member of the Libertarian Party and county chairman for several years, I could have written these descriptions myself! In its entirety, I thought the book was excellent. Frankly, as an amateur economist and libertarian, it has to rank as one of the best book I've ever read.
Rating:
Summary: Uhhh??
Review: I don't understand any of this stuff at all!!!
I found this book at my friend's house and I din't understand anything!!! Some guy writing with weird words talking about kings and presidents and how the king cares about the people more than the president or something like that. How can you read that kind of weird stuff. Get Harry Potter instead.
Rating:
Summary: Very good and original and needed (despite some huge errors)
Review: I would have given the book five stars but because the errors Hoppe makes in his analysis, I had to give it four. Nevertheless, the sacred cow "democracy" is ripe material for criticism in this hyper-political age.
Summary:
The Central theme of this book is that the governmental system of democracy is a process toward de-civilization. He introduces the book with a theoretical landscape of worldwide democracy and how sub-continent Asia (because they have the largest population in numbers) would rule the world.
Hoppe uses the "Austrian" economic model to outline the deficiencies in the systems of monarchy and democracy and comes up with the startling conclusion that monarchy is a lesser evil than democracy. Fear not, Hoppe isn't a monarchist. The system he advocates is a system of natural law-natural order. Hoppe takes from many disciplines including sociology, economics, history and philosophy. However, this book mainly is a work of political philosophy.
Hoppe accurately states that the idea of democracy does not equal self-government. Indeed, "demos" is Greek for "the many". Democracy is nothing more than majoritarian rule -i.e. `mob rule'. The reason he cites monarchy as being a lesser evil than democracy is because a monarchy is a private government instead of a public one (democracy). The monarch has to hold on to his state for his entire life as opposed to in democracy the care-taker only rules the state for a few years. The care-taker is very present oriented, according to Hoppe, and will try to exploit his position to his immediate benefit whereas a king has to hold on to the land for a long time so the king will be interested in property value appreciation. A king will only try to make his state more valuable whereas the care-taker doesn't care about the states future value since he doesn't own it -he only controls it.
Hoppe has a lot of good facts to support his argument. In medieval monarchies, kings kept taxation around 2-8 percent whereas in democracies taxes frequently exceed 50 percent. Also, before the 18th century, there were very few recorded democracies. And even the oldest example (Athens during the Golden age) didn't last long. Few philosophers, championed democracy and most thought democracy was a bad idea -the founding framers included. (The few champions of democracy were Rousseau and Spinoza.)
The deficiency with monarchy came when the king changed from being the judge in disputes, to judging the disputes according to the king's advantage. This is the main deficiency Hoppe states with monarchy. Territorial expansion was also seldom in monarchies compared to democracy with total land expansion.
Hoppe goes on to say that the main error with classic liberalism is that it entrusted property rights with the state. (He also criticizes the `Hobbesian myth' of "people in a state-of-nature are at constant war with themselves.") The period he cites when the `American experiment' failed was during the American Civil War. The idea of "successions" was stamped out during this period. Hoppe advocates succession from the state to secure absolute property rights. Hoppe also says that the idea of a nation is bad and that a world of communities each with different sets of rules set up by community members would be better.
Hoppe finally says that the idea of limited government, whether championed by classic liberals or by libertarians, is impossible. Limited government doesn't work because the state can't limit itself and its only incentive is to grow. Only in a liberal-libertarian-anarchy can Natural Order be restored.
Comments:
Great book, I loved his deconstruction of both monarchy and democracy. I also liked most of the conclusions he reached. There was some bad stuff though. The two chapters, "On cooperation, tribe, city, and state" and "On conservatism and libertarianism" could have easily been left out of the book without any of his argument suffering from the decision. His snide "holier than thou" tone in the second mentioned chapter was over the top. Hoppe also provided few sources and rants quite a bit about those damn "hippy libertarians".
The conservatism Hoppe talks about never existed and never will exist. Saying that in an anarcho-capitalistic society we would be social conservatives is based on nothing but a hunch. Libertarians are very guilty of predicating things on conservatism that just don't exist -Hoppe is no exception. Just because you want a blue car and have a red car, but you think you can "make" it blue by thinking of it as blue, doesn't make the car blue. (Conservatives and Libertarians -despite what anyone else will tell you -are natural enemies of each other. Even Hoppe's God Murray Rothbard said something to that effect in his early 70s writing.) Avarice has always existed no matter whether or not the state or community try and snuff it out. The Mises Institute thinks that there was this one conservatism that was the "good kind" way back in the day, and that thought is fundamentally flawed. The Mises institute is also very good at perverting Ludwig von Mises work.
The first chapter I mentioned is also flawed. Hoppe seems to think that we all hate each other (racial, ethnic, linguistic, otherwise) and in an anarcho-capitalist society we would live separated from each other and "trade at a distance". He even references -much to my dismay- Michael Levine, as if Levine was the final word and sociological analysis. Hoppe thinks people would want to live away from people that are different from them. I doubt it. Some things Egalitarianism espoused were bad, I'll give you that (like redistribution of wealth) but a complete rejection of anything Egalitarian is not wise.
Another problem was he referenced (what seemed like his father for Christ sake) Murray Rothbard and Ludwig von Mises way too much. He repeatedely used the same (few) sources again and again and again... His footnotes at the bottom of each page were also on many occasions ridiculously long.
There is also no philosophical defense of the "Natural Rights" doctrince. He just takes the idea as granted. What good is a "natural right" if my government doesn't lend me that right and violates it daily? Does the 'right' exist? Like Alasdair MacIntyre says, it's like calling on God without invoking God's name.
Another huge problem is that the first half of the book is incredibly well written, concise and documented but the second half comes across like it was pasted together at the last second. No defense of the huge logical leaps he makes either.
My final problem with Hans-Hermann Hoppe is that his idea of "succession" sounds nice. But if a voluntary withdraw from the government is the best thing for us to do, why hasn't he done so. Hoppe teaches at UNLV -a public institution! HA!
I always thought I was a hardcore Libertarian (notice the big `L'). A book like this though makes me seem far less extreme in comparison. Nevertheless, despite its major flaws it is an enlightening read and I would highly recommend it (4 stars!) [Also if you can get a copy, pick up H.L. Mencken's "Notes on Democracy". This is another polemical attack on democracy.]
Rating:
Summary: "The first great book of the twenty-first century"
Review: Jack Rain, a reviewer on another site, used the phrase above to describe this book, and I unhesitatingly appropriate it for my review because it is so dead-on accurate. This is a very, very good, and very, very important, book. It's also a strong argument for the author's elevation to the pantheon of pro-freedom writers and philosophers, alongside Mises, Rothbard, Spooner, de Jasay, and a select few others. I have to admit that I found the first two chapters, especially, to be tough reading, and had to work through them several times. The economic analysis in the sections on time preference, for example -- while the outline of the argument becomes clear soon enough -- need extra time for all the shadings and implications to fall into place. After that, though, the truly important work begins, as Hoppe is engaged in nothing less than (to use his own words from a slightly different context) "an ideological campaign of delegitimizing the idea and institution of democratic government." In so doing, he undertakes a two-pronged approach of both demonstrating the failures of democracy (failures that are part of the very nature of democracy, and therefore irreparable) and the superiority of "natural order" -- a condition known by many other names too, including anarcho-capitalism and individualist or free-market anarchism. Personally, I responded most strongly to Hoppe's argument that "conservatives today must be antistatist libertarians and, equally important, [that] libertarians must be conservatives" [p. 189]. In so arguing, Hoppe gives us a thorough and revealing deconstruction of modern "conservatism" (so-called), showing how many self-styled conservatives are in fact merely the right wing of social democracy. He convincingly links the Buchananites, on the other hand, to "social nationalism or national socialism" (p. 192). In either case, the neo-cons, the Buchanan brigades, and also the so-called Christian Right have, in Hoppe's eyes, "not a trace of principled antistatism." Libertarians shouldn't start feeling too smug, however. Hoppe also calls for principled antistatists to retake libertarianism from the "lifestyle libertarians," who see antistatism as just one part of a comprehensive revolt against all social order and bourgeois culture (these folks were devastatingly described by Rothbard as "modal libertarians" or MLs -- a description Hoppe reprints in a footnote). He also targets "left libertarians" like the Cato Institute and Reason magazine, whose leading lights throw in the towel on the key question of State legitimacy, revel in the glamour and importance of life Inside the Beltway, and are reduced to arguing for reductions on the margin of an ever-expanding Leviathan. Hoppe's final chapter, "On the Impossibility of Limited Government and the Prospects for Revolution," expands on the philosophical basis for his earlier-defined strategy of personal secession. (It's important to note that Hoppe's "revolution" explicitly and firmly rejects violence: "[I]t is not necessary to take [government] over, to engage in violent battle against it, or even to lay hands on one's rulers. In fact, to do so would only reaffirm the principle of compulsion and aggressive violence underlying the current system and inevitably lead to the replacement of one government or tyrant by another. To the contrary, it is only necessary that one decide to withdraw from the compulsory union and reassume one's right to self protection. Indeed, it is essential that one proceed in no other way than by peaceful secession and noncooperation" [p. 91].) This book now occupies a place of honor on my freedom bookshelf. But more than that, it's a reference I will return to (and already have returned to) often. To borrow from yet another review (Schumann's of Chopin, this time): "Hats off, gentlemen -- a genius!"
|
