Customer Reviews

Planned Chaos

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Planned Chaos was added on to Mises' masterpiece Socialism, an Economic and Sociological Analysis. Planned Chaos works well as an epilogue to Socialism. On its own it has serious limitations. To those who lack familiarity with Austrian Economics, Mises' claims might seem weakly argued. Mises explains his theoretical arguments in great detail in Socialism, an Economic and Sociological Analysis. Here the reader is left to infer much of what Mises is arguing. Only those who have read either Human Action, Socialism, or at least Bureaucracy will really get what is going on in this book. As such, this book has limited value. If you want to get the general idea about Mises read Liberalism, the Classical Tradition. That book is the best intro to Mises. This book is simply lacks the material needed to stand on its own. Read it as the epilogue to Socialism, an Economic and Sociological Analysis.

I cannot say much more in favor of this book than has been said in previous reviews. I will say that, despite my minor disagreements with Mises (which are indeed minor and do not in any way detract from Mises brilliance in defending the efficiency and benevolence of Capitalism and revealing the inefficiency and tyranny of Socialism), I give any of his works my full recommendation. Mises' works are mandatory for any serious student of econmics.
I would like to clear up the outright falsehood perpetrated by the previous reviewer (there are many, but this one is the most pernicious and positively heinous one committed). Slavery is NOT compatible with capitalism. The American south circa the American Civil War was NOT a capitalist region. Capitalism is the system which recognizes that each individual is sacrosanct and has inviolable rights. It is the complete seperation of State and economy.
Funny that an individual who recommends the work of Guevara, Hegel and Marx would gripe about slavery. Anyway, it's a short book. Read Mises' work before taking your cues from reactionaries suffering from apoplexy.

Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973) was the outstanding economist of the twentieth century. He wrote three of the most important works of social theory in recent memory: The Theory of Money and Credit; Socialism; and Human Action. In these works, he brilliantly set forth an "Austrian" analysis of free enterprise and opposing systems.

In addition to the above-referenced works, von Mises wrote a number of shorter works pitched to a more general audience. PLANNED CHAOS, which came out in 1947, is one of these. At that time - and even now - people consider "planning" to be scientific and modern. However, as von Mises shows, planning of the economy only leads to chaos, poverty, and violence. This is seen through a discussion of Marxism, Nazism, Fascism, and New Dealism.

One of the best parts of this book is a discussion of the so-called "mixed economy." As von Mises shows, an economy with a large amount of government control and intervention is not really mixed. The government control exists in a sea of freedom. This might seem like a quibble, but as von Mises demonstrated, a truly socialist economy is impossible because there would be no way to calculate prices. However, government intervention in the economy causes all sorts of problems which inevitably lead to chaos. So, ultimately the choice is between laissez faire and statism.

In addition to this, there is a good discussion of the economic nature of Naziism and its similarities to Communism. We often hear that the big difference between Nazism and Communism is that Hitler and his cronies believed in Capitalism. Of course, this is silly. Hitler believed in a government controlled economy, even if he left the price system intact.

Von Mises defense of Capitalism was based on utilitarian grounds. For different approaches, see the works of Murray Rothbard and Ayn Rand.

PLANNED CHAOS is an absolute must read for anyone interested in the survival of a free humanity, unfettered by world despotism. Its background on world history during the age of collectivism reveals the true ramifications of the facts which we already know. All this in 90 easy to read pages. I'm buying ten copies for distribution to my family and friends.