thomas

Even if you’re wrong, take solace in knowing that you can never be as wrong as Francis Fukuyama

Aviator, diver, Etherean, nexialist, PhD in aviation ∩ climate science | Host of /diving /ethfinance /eth-staker /geopolitics /science /singapore /thomas

He himself acknowledged it.

The EIU’s Democracy Index has been sliding for the past twenty years.

Liberal democracy (the version he said would boringly take over following the collapse of the Soviet Union) has been eroded not only by non-democracies consolidating power (such as China under Xi), but also within the Western bloc under the dual pressure of neoliberal economics (broadly, to the right of the political spectrum — including, in the last ten years, the rise of American jingoism and libertarianism); and of identity politics to the left, which is now experiencing a backlash.

Whatever order emerges from that may again favor liberal democracies in the future (assuming Fukuyama is right about the direction of travel toward democratic justice), but it’s very far from settled, and less so now than at any point in the last quarter century

I have not read Fukuyama but I am reading Capitalist Realism and I think Mark Fisher is making an argument that F is right in the sense that it's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of liberal capitalism.
That history has not stopped is just reactionary fighting against the stability of the system.

man really tried to capstone an uneasy global truce after industrial-scale conflict.

Depends.

If your snapshot is 19 Feb 2025, then yeah, Fukuyama's observation doesn't look too accurate!

If it's the 21st Century, then time is still on our side.

#doomeroptimism

It was always a bad framing but still possible he’ll look right again a decade from now. 🤞

Let's not forget that making mistakes is a crucial part of the learning process. Everyone, including Francis Fukuyama, has been wrong at some point. What matters is the ability to reflect, learn, and grow from those mistakes.