Posted: Mon Dec 13, 2010 5:21 pm Post subject: Francis Fukuyama
As posted on mycsw:
• What exactly is Fukuyama’s hypothesis/thesis in your own words? Does he make a convincing, well-proven case? Do you agree with him? Why or why not?
• How might the ideas apply to your final project?
I can't even begin to describe how frustrated this reading made me. I guess to summarize Fukuyama's theory into my own words, it is the assumption that Neo-Liberalism, or as he put it, Western Liberal Ideology, is the end all be all in history. He justified this conclusion by claiming Marx believed communism as the ultimate end in historical developement. "The notion of the end of history is not an original one. Its best propagator was Karl Marx, who believed that the direction of historical development was a puroposeful one... and would come to an end only with the achievement of a communist utopia." (165). But what bothered me specifically was the general bs with which this statement was made. Had we not discussed in class that Marx's theory assumed communism as the next course in history, just as feudal society or ancient mode had been the next step in relation to the previous form of economics? Had Marx never claimed to know the future, but only examine the past? This is minute and even our reading sort of supports any fuzzy interpretation " Before long they will realise tha to be human, they will have to bring an end to the conditions which make for capitalist society... there will arise a new form of scoiety... communism devised for the good of all." (78}
So I guess what really bothered me was the general tightness and succinctness of Fukuyama's argument. As we had discussed in class, it seemed rather difficult to rail against. His examinations of both China and Soviet Russia and they're slow progression towards liberalisism supported his claim that history had reached an end, not concluded by everyone reaching the final destination, but a general consensus and recognition over and of the ideologically superior socioeconomic concepts in Neo Liberalism.
I'll try and post again later tonight when I get home to a book by Noam Chomsky, who I know has a lot to say against the assumed infallibility of Neo-Liberalism.
What struck me was how outdated this philosophy sounded in 2010. Twenty years ago, it may well have seemed that we were approaching "the end of history", if there is such a thing. However, I was brought back to something that Rachel Hirsch said early on in the class. We are looking at history in the Post-9/11 era, and I think that is definitely reflected in Fukuyama's document. Specifically, Fukuyama says that large states who have seen the end of history will no longer engage in serious conflict. The U.S. is definitely a large state, and one in which, Fukuyama would argue, history has ended. So...what about the serious, drawn-out conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan? It was also interesting when he said that art or philosophy could not continue among states who were at the end of their history, because I feel like art and philosophy will always continue unless the world is completely stagnant. Even if history has ended there is some change in the world, and so this seems unfounded.
Let me first state that I have not yet finished the reading, I'm only on page 170, but one thing has really bothered me throughout what I've read.
Fukuyama has a monomaniacal focus on ideology, one that I really can't stand when looking at history. He treats Liberalism as a sort of Ultimate Goal of human life, one that has been worked towards for all our history. I can't claim that I'm a terribly idealistic person, but I hardly believe that western liberalism is some sort of grand conclusion to human existence for a few reasons:
First, liberalism is, as Karl stated, hardly an infallible ideal; in Neo-Liberal countries, there remains a large amount of conflict within them and large populations without their needs met, saying nothing of the HIGHLY aggressive nature of those countries, making the Hegel interpretation of an end of history still in the future.
Second, Fukuyama makes, of what I've read, little to no mention of any sort of material influence on the idealistic world. Any reasonably stable, aggressive group in history with access to enough resources has the capability to make itself a dominant, far-reaching influence regardless of philosophy. In response to his views on the collapse of communism and fascism (169-170), I'd have to say it is because of the Neo-Liberal countries that they failed. This may be a bit of my inner evolutionary biologist coming out, but I believe that, as a social and highly intelligent animal, that humans are driven by not just self-interest, but in the interest of their family, pack, tribe, etc. Without that broader interest, altruism would not exist (A behavior that has been observed in, among other animals, chimps, dolphins and elephant, all social creatures). By virtue of the fact that our "pack" ie. Neo-Liberal countries, was threatened, we moved to counter this threat on every front we could. By virtue of the fact we already had a large influence in the world, we were largely able to defeat these threats.
I've got a little more to rant on, but I've still got to finish the reading.
So as far as I can tell regarding Fukuyama he thinks this: Democracy is, and has proven to be the most effective form of human government and is, the final stage of history and there will be no more developments after the Western Liberal Ideology. I am not sure quite what to make of this, considering I did some digging and found that I did agree with Fukuyama regarding his ideas about transhumanism. In regards to his statement in this reading, I think I agree and disagree at the same time. On the agreeing factor, I have to say I cannot think of a more perfect system for which humans can thrive in than capitalism. We have seen the effects of other governments around the world attempting form societies with planned economies and socialized living and seen them fail. In that sense I do agree with Fukuyama, history does end with democracy. However, hannah made a good point, we do still fight wars, and have problems. However now that I think about it I do agree completely with Fukuyama, because not all countries in the world are democracies hence the world still struggles with violence and anger. I believe that if all countries had a system similar to the (mostly) fair democratic system we have here in the united states, maybe we would in fact, end. I think this defnitely gonna help me in final project because it establishes my belief in history as something finite that I can definitely use to help form my sentence.
What he was saying is that for all intents and purposes history has ended. Not to say that time stops but that “there is no struggle or conflict over ‘large’ issues” (p167). Fukuyama believes that neo-liberalism is the end of history because liberalism has been what history is building toward. He makes it clear that he doesn’t think the world is perfect, since there are obvious injustices, but that in these societies “the root causes of economic inequality do not have to do with the underlying legal and social structure of our society” (p170).
Like Karl said he does make a convincing argument when he uses China as an example of the progression toward this ‘end’ or history. Still I TOTALLY disagree. First off, like Hannah said, there is still conflict over large issues. 9/11, iraq, our current economic state. In addition, art and philosophy have continued in this so-called post-history era, which he said wouldn’t happen (p117). My main problem with his argument was his totally dismissing developing societies. He addresses it saying: “clearly the vast bulk of the Third World remains very much mired in history, and will be a terrain of conflict for many years to come, but let us focus for the time being on the larger and more developed states of the world…” (p175). Why should the more developed states be more important to the linear progression of history? I don’t think history can be “ended” universally unless the whole world is developmentally out of conflict (……..which will never happen……..). Also, a quote I mentioned before was “the root causes of economic inequality do not have to do with the underlying legal and social structure of our society” (p170). I think the root causes of inequalities do lie almost exclusively in flaws in our legal and social structure. (This kind of reminds me of our discussion about the all school book and problems with the housing system).
What I struggled with when reading this was that his definition of history seemed to be drastically different than the one I developed. To me, the end of history would mean the end of any event or action, which is clearly not what it mean to Fukuyama. This should help with our project by looking at his different view of history.
Also, my question for you guys is what do you think is a concise definition for liberalism based on the reading? I had trouble getting a grasp on that.
Who the fuck do all these people think they are claiming that history is dead? Yeah there's a lot of historical evidence to back up their claims but baseline, they cant predict the future. Maybe History will revitalize tomorrow, maybe in 1000 years, maybe never, but they can't say for certain that it has reached an end.
This reading was much different than the ones we have read in the past. This article, which it obviously did to some other people, really bothered me. It's just extremely uncomfortable thinking about the end of history, which would be in a Hegelian sense the end of human evolution. History ends when “all prior contradictions are resolved and all human needs are satisfied.” (pg 167) Like Hannah said, this was written pre-9/11. I think it is true that history will end when there is peace, and no more conflict. History is all about evolution, and without conflict, we cannot learn, which means we can't evolve (dialectic).
Fukuyama said:
"The end of history will be a very sad time. The struggle for recognition, the willingness to risk one's life for a purely, the worldwide ideological struggle... will be replaced by economic calculation, the endless solving of technical problems, environmental concerns, and the satisfaction of sophisticated consumer demand. In the post historical there will be neither art nor philosophy, just the perpetual care taking of the museum of human history.
Fukuyama was beginning to see this happen, and felt things were going to become less about war and conflict, and more about materialism.
I this Fukuyama is correct about what will happen at the end of history, but I don't think history will end for a very long time because of humans constant tendency to fight.
I don't think I realized until after writing this post how much this reading has effected what I think history is.
Fukuyama uses 'history' in a very narrow sense, to mean the struggle over controling the means of production and the form of government in the largest, most powerful nations. Because Western Liberal Ideology appeared to triumph over fascism and communism by 1989, and with no other competing systems in view, he thinks this struggle has ended. This all makes sense, or did make sense in 1989, if you have the devotion to Hegel's dialectic view of history that Fukuyama has.
But this is too simplistic. History is the story of conflict, but also of cooperation, innovation, and all other human behaviors, good and bad. As Hannah points out, one of Fukuyama's large liberal states -- and clearly his favorite, the U.S. -- has become engaged in two wars in the last decade, which hardly gives us reason to think there will not be more equally senseless wars, and probably involving other western powers as well as the U.S.
And what about all the other nations? Will China really follow a Western Liberal Path? Will Russia? When will the Muslim world begin to see the value in Western Liberalism?
Finally, what about new problems, such as global warming and battles over scarce resources? Will nations, rich and poor, settle their differences over these problems peacefully? To be sure of this, we would have to believe, with Fukuyama, that "the root causes of economic inequality do not have to do with the underlying legal and social structure of our society," so that other countries, if they simply adopted our Western Liberalism, would end their inequality. But several of us don't seem to have bought this argument, even for our own country, at all. And we could say even more. The triumph of Western Liberal Ideology that Fukuyama sees, in America and elsewhere, is mostly the triumph of white European men. What about everyone else -- who can apparently be ignored?
I do think this reading points up a major question for all our history readings. Is the course of history progressive, does it move in one generally positive direction? And if it does, will it ever reach some wonderful end? And how will anyone know if it does?
But holy moly. This dude is smart. He uses historical sources clearly and concisely to make his point... and even though I don't agree with his thesis that history is/was over, I am very impressed by the way he puts forward ideas.
I guess the thing that totally blows me away is that he's taking pretty much the same sources that we have, but using them to prove an idea that I'm pretty sure a lot of us disagree with. I think that speaks a lot to our final project, especially the "What is truth?" question. Because if Francis Fukuyama can so clearly make his point using the sources at hand... what other points could be made? Is it possible to twist source material to fit into almost any mold? What is true?
sarah you inspired me to write before i finished too.
i'll have more developed ideas on this reading when i finish (tomorrow morning..) BUT
although this punk is pretty smart, and uses lots of evidence to back up his theories blahblahblah, i think you still have to be pretty self-righteous to say that we have..plateaued as a society. to not be able to see past our current way of life still seems ignorant and encourages a homogeneous population. which is an ignorant population.
Like what Karl was getting at, I think that Fukuyama was responding not to Marx's actual philosophy, but rather the response to that philosophy. Marx never claimed a communist utopia was an endpoint, just a stop on the evolutionary way.
It just seems so overwhelmingly... cocky to declare the end of history. But that's in true neoconservative style, I think, to work under the assumption that your current system is so full and complete and developed that there couldn't possibly be something better. He uses historical examples, but through a neoliberalistic lens. He sees the possible contradictions of liberalism as communism and fascism, which have been proved ineffective.
I think philosophical conclusions like this can be interesting but also incredibly dangerous. We've seen that before (Darwin vs. social darwinism, Marx vs. communist regimes) when philosophy has been used to justify awful things. I think this is no exception. Taking this strictly from the context of the reading, Fukuyama comes from a political group that is very, very aggressive when it comes to imposing what they think is the best system (the end of political philosophical history, apparently) in foreign countries, often to the peril of the people living there. Which is something to consider.
The way he ends it is strange to me. I can't tell if he is being facetious in his last paragraph, maybe because I feel like this whole thing should be a joke.
So, to be completely honest, I'm not that upset with what Fukuyama is saying. The main reason that I say that is because I think he draws a fine line between the concept of social/communal progress and history; and how we define those two things. I don't think that he's saying that we will become a static society/world- in fact he states that in the first page of the reading. "This is not to say that there will no longer be events to fill the pages of Foreign Affair's yearly summaries of international relations, for the victory of liberalism has occurred primarily in the realm of ideas or consciousness and is as yet incomplete in the real or material world" (The End of History, 165). Granted, he's a bit of an asshole in how he articulated it, but we get what he meant.
I think there's validity to what he's saying. It seems as though he is using a very classic definition of history, one that most events in this day and age (and presumably events to come) do not fit. But that's the beauty of this Hegelian interpretation of history. As some of us have observed, Fukuyama centers his thoughts on history around Ideology and consciousness. He gets more specific and states "... insofar as man for him was the product of his concrete historical and social environment and not, as earlier natural right theorists would have it, a collection of more or less fixed 'natural' attributes" (The End of History, 166). Essentially, he's saying that one is a product of the environment in which they live. I'm not surprised to hear what he has to say about history and how there will be no more of it because I recognize that in this day and age, some have the privilege to create the environment in which they live. Seeing as this man is a Hegelian, he's a conservative thinker, and he's got an opinion he's sticking to, why WOULD his end result and thoughts on history be anything other than what we're reading?
And on another note, Hegel makes it clear that consciousness takes many forms-"...religion or simple cultural or moral habits" (The End of History, 167). The same way that no one can say wether or not history will continue, no one can approve of another's consciousness of the world we live in.
This is getting rather long! But before I wrap it up, I just wanted to throw out a question: Are Fukuyama's thoughts simply a product of Hegel's understanding of history and how it works?
Hannah- So the reading talked of the stages to history in other places and how after the end of conflict there should be no more like massive conflict? First of all, I wanted to compare that to a human, how after a human has a bad situation in their life they learn from it and become enlightened and learn how to avoid bad things in the future, and thatt's kind of the goal and end of the cycle. What I wanted to say about the US is, he thought we had reached our end-point, and that should have been it, and we should have learned and not had anymore bad conflict, but his conclusions were based off of other places, and the US is very behind other places in many ways, and maybe we just learn slower and cant become enlightened as easily because were younger or something.
also! in response to the-other-sarah, i agree that maybe the most important thing to take from this reading is that we're working with the same sources, analyzing and posing our conclusions but we're coming up with very, very different conclusions from fukuyama. our class has been emphasizing progress so much that even the title of this reading is sort of a smack in the face to me. but ultimately fukuyama is arguing intelligently, and logically.
maybe what bohr was saying about two truths existing side-by-side in seeming paradox is applicable.
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