Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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4.0 out of 5 stars
Insightful both for those on the right and on the left of the political spectrum., November 8, 2009
Originally published in 1937, The Good Society is a timeless and profound analysis of the liberal cause. I am surprised that the book has not previously been reviewed on Amazon, as the topic covered by Mr. Lippmann is currently under vociferous debate in the United States, and with the election of a liberal President I would expect some resurgent interest in such classic works.
I have to say I was very positively surprised by this book; I was expecting liberal propaganda, espousing policies along FDR's New Deal. Somewhat to the contrary, Mr. Lippmann actually gives liberalism a very careful and thoughtful analysis and his conclusions are distanced from what liberals would probably agree with today. This is a book that should be read by men on both sides of the political spectrum, for it has valuable and relevant insights for the open-minded reader. However, I doubt that either side could ever take this book as a pillar of their platform. For the first half will appeal to generally described right-wingers (let's call them descendants of Hayek's thoughts), while the second half will probably offend them, and may in fact appeal to left-wingers (let's call them Keynesians). After all, Mr. Lippmann was attempting to present the theory of a progressive and liberal Good Society. It is interesting to note that Mr. Lippmann acknowledged the influence of both Hayek and Keynes on his work. Maybe that is why without an open mind, men with strong views on either side of the political spectrum simply struggle to get through The Good Society. The Good Society is not an easy read, but it is highly stimulating. For those with the patience and an open mind - it is well worth it.
The book is divided into four parts. The first part describe how men have increasingly been led to believe that technical knowledge will allow them to run a better organized state. Mr. Lippmann disputes this, arguing that while we are better equipped to understand our surroundings, human interactions themselves are becoming more complex and we should not be led astray by the illusion that we in fact control destiny to any greater extent. A quote which I liked and I think captured the essence of this argument reads: "If men can travel faster but have to go farther, they do not thereby arrive sooner at their destination. [...] The human beings who actually govern have apparatus which covers more ground and therefore gives them more ground to cover. In between their greater complexities on the one hand and their more efficient instruments on the other they remain human beings with faculties of insight and foresight that have not grown appreciably greater in recorded history, and may in any one generation be regarded as fixed." A lot of modern-day politicians would benefit from a dose of humility along those lines.
The second part describes the errors and internal logical conflicts of collectivism. Mr. Lippmann describes the impossibility of any sort of free demand in a planned economy, he identifies flaws in Marx's philosophy and he introduces the concept of "gradual collectivism". Some of the quotes that illustrate Mr. Lippmann's thoughts: "One kind of privilege in particular would, therefore, be ineradicable in a socialist state. This is the privilege of ruling it. In a planned economy some must make the plan and administer it, the rest obey and be administered." Or another one: "In short, communism, when it abolishes private property in productive capital, establishes a new kind of property in the public offices which manage the collective capital. The commissars replace the capitalists, exercising the same powers or greater ones, enjoying the same social privileges or greater ones, and though their money incomes may be less, their luxuries less florid, they have everything that could tempt the less favoured to envy them, challenge them, and to strive to replace them." This section is of particular importance as it shows that progressives and liberals can (and should) be concerned with collectivism. And some of Mr. Lippmann's attacks on Socialism are novel, even for ardent students of von Mises and Hayek. I found the views on property rights a particular complement to what I have read elsewhere.
In the third part, Mr. Lippmann defines his Good Society. He explains why laissez-fair was a necessary movement, but at some stage became insufficient to remain the dominant dogma of the age. It is the contents of this section which marks Mr. Lippmann's departure from the thoughts of Hayek (and von Mises). Modern day liberals have a lot to learn from the thoughts contained in this section. It describes probably the most coherent attempt of a "third way" philosophy, yet at the same time, it never fails to give due credit to the market as the imperative tool for the allocation of capital and labour. Mr. Lippmann writes about Karl Marx and Adam Smith; about the division of labour and property titles. He asks why politicians have turned to collectivism for realizing men's hopes. He analyzes why the liberal (in this case libertarian) philosophy became untenable. He talks about the failure of classical economics (too many assumptions and perfect theoretical models that do not represent reality). He talks about the perception of injustice and misery. From all these thoughts he then tries to provide the foundations for a Great Society. Mr. Lippman describes how a more even distribution of income is required; he argues that this is so because some income is "unearned" and results from inequalities of opportunity and from monopoly, and so needs to be taxed. But Mr. Lippmann is against "taking from the rich and giving doles to the poor" as it would "defeat itself and [...] paralyze and impoverish the whole economy". He says, in probably his most brilliant insight of this section, that "The equalization [of income] must be effected by measures which promote the efficiency of the markets as regulators of the division of labor; they must strike, therefore, not at the profits of successful competition but at the tolls of monopoly. The taxes of the rich must be spent not on doles to the poor but on the reform of the conditions which made the poor." Now, this is something all leaders of the West should read and contemplate upon. This is what the true liberals championed. Unfortunately, it is very different than the agenda of many of today's political parties.
The fourth part is probably the least original to the modern reader. Most of the statements seem self evident to citizens of Western democracies, even if the ideal espoused does not quite live up to reality. Mr. Lippmann presents his idea of what a liberal state should be; he writes "The liberal state is to be conceived as the protector of equal rights by dispensing justice among individuals. It seeks to protect men against arbitrariness, not arbitrarily to direct them."
On the whole, this book should be read for its contrast between the second and third sections. It is so refreshing to see one author warning against the dangers of collectivism, yet at the same time attempting to create what some on the left would see as social justice. I personally don't agree with a lot of what Mr. Lippmann writes in the third section of the book, but his attempt is gallant. Today's politicians should read this work to get a glimpse of what thoughtful liberals were trying to establish as the dominant philosophy of the modern left. They might be surprised.
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by Walter Lippmann
by Edward L. Bernays
by Ronald Steel
by John Dewey
