Francis Fukuyama, a giant among contemporary political scientists/theorists, has penned a brief and eloquent defense of liberalism, <i>Liberalism and Its Discontents</i>, which also includes a summary of the criticisms that have been leveled at this political philosophy from both the left and right. On the left, a belief in extreme individual autonomy, an assault on rationality, and cultural intolerance with a deference to the tribal ids of historically marginalize groups threaten the culture of liberalism. On the right, the weaponization of a post-rationality information space and an interest in rolling back elements of democratic and cultural liberation threaten the order and legitimacy of liberal democracy.

Due to the current usage of the word liberalism, Fukuyama is careful to define his titular term. His usage is aligned with what we often call "Classical Liberalism" but given that this term has also become freighted with new meaning, he also invokes Deirdre McCloskey's term "humane liberalism." He asserts his term refers to the doctrine that emerged in the latter half of the 1600s (i.e. the Enlightenment) and argued for the primacy of individual rights ensured by an effective yet limited government. Fukuyama builds upon this minimalistic definition throughout the early portions of the book, sketching out the meaning of the components of liberal tradition: individualism, egalitarianism, universalism, and meliorism, and then providing the practical, moral, and economic basis for liberalism's superiority to other governing doctrines. Essentially, Fukuyama see liberalism as the best way to protect human life and dignity, promote prosperity, and navigate the tensions created by diverse interests. However, the catch is that liberalism must remain neutral on conceptions of the good, meaning it must tolerate diverse ethical and political frameworks within its big tent (i.e. subsidiarity). To complete his beautiful defense, he parries critiques of liberalism by arguing that most of the failures of liberal governance have stemmed from a failure of moderation - either liberal ideas were overextended (i.e. neoliberalism and progressivism) or ignored .

Although Fukuyama ultimately rejects many of the criticism of liberalism, he is sympathetic to many of these criticisms even echoing them at certain points. For instance, Fukuyama dedicates a chapter to a discussion of the excesses and dangers of neoliberalism by which he means an overly eager embrace of free market economics and intense hostility toward governmental regulation and intervention. This countenances left-of-center economic concerns about inequality as within the bounds of liberalism, while also defending the moral importance of private property and practical efficiency of markets. He also incisively dissects the flaws of Rawlsian conceptions of justice, critical theory, and features of progressive activism (e.g. identity-based politicking), which make for some of the most insightful portions of the work. He also skewers more governmental approaches to enforcing conceptions of a moral life, which lands punches against both the left and right but more so on the "common good" conservatives of the new right.

Despite the merits of Fukuyama's claims, there are some apparent limitations, which he mostly glosses over. First, his claim that liberalism and liberal democracy can function without a shared ethical system or moral vision is dubious given that many ideas in the liberal tradition are de facto imbued with moral valence. In fact, the very act of making normative claims about a political doctrine is forwarding a particular moral vision. Moreover, his conception of liberalism would seems inevitable to lend itself to conflicts of moral vision among competing factions, which the state is unlikely to be able to definitively resolve given its largely neutral stance. Thus, the purported crisis of liberalism today - I'm dubious about whether there is such a crisis but Fukuyama is not - will continue indefinitely until government turn to illiberal modes. Second, his defense of liberalism borders on an appeal to purity (aka the No True Scotsmen fallacy) because he dismisses failures of liberalism as misapplications rather than externalities. It is difficult to confidently assess how the application of political ideas actually results in particular outcomes given the confluence of factors that influence sociological events. I have some other quibbles of disagreements with Fukuyama, but they sit outside his descriptive claims about liberalism, having more to do with normative and empirical claims about particular political programs. Finally, I think Fukuyama overestimates the importance of ideas. His narrative is almost completely invested in the premise that our political ideas have an almost perfect correlation with the actual realities of human sociopolitical dynamics. I am somewhat skeptical about this. I think many of the purported outgrowth of liberalism may be some of the causes of liberalism and that they may be the consequence of certain material processes beyond the bounds of ideology and discourse.

Ultimately, what makes this book such an excellent read is that Fukuyama's descriptions of liberal and contra-liberal ideas are amazingly pithy. He writes propulsively about abstractions, which is quite an accomplishment. The clarity and power of his mind make for a dazzling display. I recommend this book unreservedly.

Sometimes, when you try to say everything in single book, you end up saying very little. That's what happened in Fukuyama's Liberalism and Its Discontents.

Fukuyama isn't writing about liberalism as opposed to conservatism in US politics. His title refers to secular liberal societies that value individual liberty and equality. Into the first half of the book, he tries to cram the entire history of liberalism and alternatives to it. While he promotes traditional liberalism, he can't seem to decide whether the Reagan/Thatcher detour into neoliberalism was mostly good or mostly bad. He also appears not to recognize the continuation of neoliberalism into the current day.

He shows his deepest blind spots when he associates liberalism with Europeans who colonized the lands of others, and enslaved, and killed indigenous people who lived on the lands that Europeans claimed as their own. He notes that the Europeans made the land more productive, which he suggests was better for everyone. (Even the people who were killed and enslaved? How does that work?)

Clearly, liberalism cannot be both about universal equality and enslavement. But Fukuyama doesn't explore this contradiction.

The book only gets interesting when he moves away from his attempt at summing up history and focuses on the issues we face today, where illiberalism is coming at us from the far right but also from what purports to be the far left (where it looks like a different flavor of far right in its focus on categorizing everyone by race and its demand for orthodoxy).

Many label this pseudo-left movement progressivism, and Fukuyama uses that term, but it is really more a fringe movement that, for lack of a better term, has been more accurately labeled wokeism. His definition of this movement is perfect. He says it "elevates the value of group experiences over what diverse individuals hold in common. This understanding of identity in time merges cleanly with a historical nationalism more commonly associated with the right."

His explanation of wokeism and its illiberalism is good, but it isn't a book's worth of good. My sense is that this work wouldn't have found a publisher had its author not already been famous. I wish I could rate it more highly. Thank you for the opportunity to review it.

Liberalism and its Discontents is a provocative title that may attract the attention of right-wing populists who think they see an ally as well as leftwing progressives spoiling for a fight. Those who have read Francis Fukuyama’s earlier writing, though, will know what to expect, and Fukuyama provides a well-reasoned examination and critique of how the political left and right have both done damage to the classical liberalism that emerged during the seventeenth century to limit the powers of governments and protect the rights of diverse people living under those governments.
The book examines the foundational classical liberal ideas of economic liberalism and personal autonomy, including free speech, and explores the core ideas of today’s contemporary liberalism. It also discusses the critique of modern scientific thinking, a critique that both the right and left seem to share. Fukuyama describes how populists on the right and progressives on the left are both unhappy with the way classical liberalism has evolved but states that this is not because of any fundamental flaw in liberalism but because, for example, conservatives see the emphasis on personal autonomy to be a threat to their deeply held religious and cultural beliefs and progressives object to how the rules protect existing elites, which tends to increase economic inequalities and social justice. These manifest themselves in things like calls for book bans and cancel culture. While Fukuyama acknowledges the legitimate “discontents” of both sides, he also recognizes the resulting threats to liberalism’s basic foundations. As an intelligent, rational being, Fukuyama does not try to offer a panacea but states some principles for a modern liberal society and (SPOILER ALERT! ) concludes with a call for moderation from all sides.
Liberalism and Its Discontents is aimed at an intelligent general reader, and the style is generally clear and not overly pedantic. There are a number of highlights in my ebook and notes like “Well put” and “Too true!”. As a good scholar, Fukuyama cites his sources carefully and has given me several titles to add to my TBR stack as well as an urge to reread some classics. However, it could be improved by defining terms like Overton Window that most people would not know and also by defining more clearly and precisely important terms like neoliberalism. And while I am pleased he did not turn the book into a tome, I would have liked somewhat longer exploration of some topics like the economic elements of alternatives to today and perhaps less stress on identity politics.
Many people today are concerned about the state of our society, but those who care enough to write about it usually have an axe to grind. This is one of the most well-balanced books of its type that I have read in a long time and is worth the attention of anyone who cares about our future.

Fukuyama illustrates how classical liberalism has come under pressure from the far right and the far left, and points out some uncomfortable similarities between the political extremes in oder to argue for more moderation and the protection of diversity. "Classical liberalism" in this context means liberal democracy, so a rule of law and a system of formal rules that restrict the powers of a democratically elected executive in order to protect individual freedom; Fukuyama explicity dismisses neoliberalism as he argues that economic efficiency shouldn't trump all other social values, and he also dismisses libertarianism as it devalues the potentially positive impact of good governance.

Then he tackles a topic that has become hip in the realm of PoliSci, and for good reason: Critical theory vs. the scientific method. When knowledge is subjective and language an arbitrary construct dominated by underlying power discourses, how can we as a society agree on an objective reality? This also points to Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment, as the following proposition is pretty hard to dismiss: "It is this mutual recognition that makes possible democratic deliberation and choice." Identity politics shouldn't be a means to exclusion, but a tool to implement justice and equality as promised by classically liberal declarations.

When it comes to the division between woke progressives and the alt-right (now also featuring COVID deniers) which is particularly extreme in the US, but also rising in Europe, Fukuyama notes: "Both sides quietly entertain hopes that a large majority of their fellow citizens secretly agree with them and are prevented from expressing this agreement only through media manipulations and false consciousness propagated by various elites", and that both sides tend to dismiss government as incompetent or even illegitimate - unfortunately, there is something to that.

So while once again, many of Fukuyama's arguments can be contested (as a German, I'm frequently puzzled by US-American positions on free speech), but the text is a great basis for discussion, as it questions ideological thinking.