Ferguson, Niall  | Allen Lane

0원  | 20120901  | 9781846147432

he decline of the West is something that has long been prophesied. Symptoms of decline are all around us today, it seems: slowing growth, crushing debts, aging populations, anti-social behaviour. But what exactly is amiss with Western civilization? The answer, Niall Ferguson argues, is that our institutions - the intricate frameworks within which a society can flourish or fail - are degenerating. Representative government, the free market, the rule of law and civil society: these were once the four pillars of West European and North American societies. It was these institutions, rather than any geographical or climatic advantages, that set the West on the path to global dominance after around 1500. In our time, however, these institutions have deteriorated in disturbing ways. Our democracies have broken the contract between the generations by heaping IOUs on our children and grandchildren. Our markets are increasingly distorted by over-complex regulations that are in fact the disease of which they purport to be the cure. The rule of law has metamorphosed into the rule of lawyers. And civil society has degenerated into uncivil society, where we lazily expect all our problems to be solved by the state. "The Degeneration of the West" a powerful - and in places polemical - indictment of an era of negligence and complacency. While the Arab world struggles to adopt democracy, and while China struggles to move from economic liberalization to the rule of law, Europeans and Americans alike are frittering away the institutional inheritance of centuries. To arrest the degeneration of the West's once dominant civilization, Ferguson warns, will take heroic leadership and radical reform. This book is based on Niall Ferguson's 2012 BBC Reith Lectures, which were broadcast under the title "The Rule of Law and Its Enemies".

니얼 퍼거슨  | Penguin Press

0원  | 20130613  | 9781594205453

영국 BBC 라디오 4에서 방송된 니얼 퍼거슨의 리스 강연, ‘법치주의와 적’ “서양의 제도와 경제는 무엇이 잘못되었을까?” 지금 미국을 비롯한 서구 세계는 심각한 위기에 빠졌다. 빚은 늘어나고 경제활동은 최악의 상황으로 치닫고 있다. 젊은이들은 일하지 않고 정치판에서는 욕설이 난무한다. 세계화, IT혁명, 기술혁신은 성장과 부의 분배라는 길목에서 아무런 해결책이 되지 못하고 있다. 무엇이 문제일까? 오랫동안 봉인되어 있던 네 개의 블랙박스, 그 안에 도사리고 있는 정교하면서도 복잡하게 얽혀 있는 제도들을 세심하게 들여다본다. 이 책은 ‘법치주의와 적’이라는 제목으로 영국 BBC 라디오 4에서 방송된, 세계적인 경제사학자이자 하버드대 교수 니얼 퍼거슨의 ‘리스 강연’을 정리하여 엮은 것이다. 세계사적 전환의 시점에 그가 내놓은 미래 예측은 국내외 언론에서 활발한 조명을 받았으며, ‘차이메리카(Chimerica)’라는 용어로도 유명하다.