Edmund Burke, the intellectual father of conservatism, famously pointed out that the real social contract is not between the rulers and the ruled, as Rousseau had it, but rather, ‘between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born’. Niall Ferguson, in this little book, explains that present-day Western governments (and others, too) are happy to commit themselves to costly but vote-catching social provisions that have to be financed by government borrowing. What govern...

The Great Degeneration is another book that ought to be mandatory reading for every American - but then someone would have to translate it to a seventh grade reading level so most of us could understand it. Ferguson is not at all optimistic about the future of Western Culture and America in particular. He sights the usual suspects: our overwhelming public and private debt, our inept government regulation of business and banking, the total lack of appropriate punishment for those responsible for

Among his many works, Niall Ferguson's triad of Empire, Colossus, and Civilization form a sweeping commentary on the rise and stagnation of the West. The Great Degeneration is a short coda to his previous books, and identifies looks at what has gone wrong in the West. Adapted from the 2012 BBC Reith Lectures, Ferguson highlights four institutions key to democratic success, which are now broken. Specifically he describes a breakdown in the generational social contract; poorly regulated markets; c...

*A full executive summary of this book is available here: http://newbooksinbrief.com/2013/06/25...Over the past half-millennium the West has built up a substantial lead over other parts of the world when it comes to both economic power and material standard of living. Now, however, this lead is slipping away. Indeed, developing nations led by such powers as China and India are quickly closing the gap, as they are experiencing impressive economic growth, while the West is stagnating. Many argue t...

Perhaps pinker’s optimism doesn’t quite suit you, and in your readings you are seeing something closer to grey skies that you perceive above . If you are searching for such a thing, this wouldn’t be a terrible place to start. Here is what it is about in the author’s terms (found near the end of its conclusion):“Countries arrive at the stationary state, as Adam Smith argued, when their ‘laws and institutions’ degenerate to the point that elite rent-seeking dominates the economic and political pr

I really am not sure what to think of this book. On the one hand, it brings up themes that serve as foundations to western civilization which Ferguson does a good job of explaining. On the other hand, the cherry picking sprinkled with personal examples he uses as evidence fall short, especially since there some self contradiction in wat he writes. Also, there were a few times when he started on a theme, and struck a different tangent, as if stating, "wait, I have a better way of explaining this

Superficial and disappointing. Basically a very brief book that rehashes and endorses unoriginal existing structural arguments about societal decline, primarily revolving around institutions. But Ferguson ignores non-economic forms and manifestations of degeneration, as well as all in-depth cultural analysis. Avoid.

The Great Degeneration was clearly written by a champion of capitalism. While I don't agree with everything he said, I really liked his opinion about education. He posited that education solely directed by the government delivers poor results. In order for there to be a strongly educated populace there needs to be both public and private educational institutions. He touted the success rates of charter schools in American and suggested the "voucher" system in Denmark shows remarkable results. All...

The Great Degeneration is not a hard or long read. Unfortunately, it's is also not a good read, as Ferguson never gets around to proving his point; the how or why our institutions in the West are failing. Ferguson focuses on four areas of our society: democracy, market capitalism, the rule of law, and civil society, and attempts to show how each of these institutions have greatly regressed, to the point where the West is now in stagnation. He traces the history of these institutions, how they de...

I enjoyed this book, but don't think I got everything out of it that I could have--I listened to it while exercising. Ferguson argues that you can't really understand economic breakdown by looking at numbers alone. You need to look at larger institutional breakdowns in society. I liked the comparisons Ferguson made between countries with deregulation vs. heavy regulations, after which he argued that deregulation is less problematic than bad regulations. I also particularly appreciated his points...

Contrary to The Economist, I did not quite find this book “a dazzling history of Western ideas.” Many of those ideas that might be worthwhile are never properly explained. In summary, the degeneration of Western society is caused by strangling the economy with excess regulation, robbing the next generation with debt, undermining rule of law with lawyer hegemony, and delegating civic responsibility from society to the state. But how can we discuss degeneration without knowing what the goals of a

Short review: I think Ferguson is full of crap. Moderate, amateur review: I don't have the training or the IQ to debate this guy head to head, but I suspect three-fourths of what he says is crap. Ferguson's basic thesis is that the West is in a state of "degeneration," or stagnation, due to overregulation, government intrusion into civic life, and a rule of lawyers rather than a rule of law, among other things. Our glory days are over; since we are no longer ascending, we're vulnerable to compet...

Good but not resounding in its assertion of cause. Ferguson’s book (without an index) lays blame for the West’s decline on the failure of institutions, while poo-pooing culture as fundamental in that decline. Ferguson’s institutions of note are democracy, over-regulated economies, improper laws, and dead social capital. Social capital lost not to technology (per Putnam’s Bowling Alone), but rather the handing over of social associations and their solutions to paid lobbyists and the Nanny State.

Drawing upon the essential social scientific theories from North, Collier, Shleifer, Bagehot, Weber, De Soto, Tocqueville, and others, Ferguson presents substantial evidence that the core institutions (democracy, capitalism, rule of law, and civil society) of Western nations are being gravely eroded and those nations stand to decline further unless action is taken.The primary deteriorative forces include excessive public debt, which effectively benefits the present at the expense of the future,

There seem to be two-- or perhaps more--Niall Fergusons out there. One is a very accomplished historian, who, starting with work on German inflation and a biography of the House of Rothschild and on into The Cash Nexus, established his bona fides as a historian, especially in the financial realm. His The Pity of War and The War of the World move into thoughtful considerations of the great upheavals of the 20th century. In addition the books, he parlayed his work into televised programs. More rec...

Honestly, I agreed with some of the points he made, but Ferguson uses examples and quotes without context. This is quite strange to me as he is a historian and should know that it is important to explain context. However, I was quite disappointed with his fourth chapter about the "uncivil society" in which he sounded like "Old Man Yells At Clouds" as he states that engagement is "way down" in terms of what he deems to be typical types of civil activity without expanded upon why the new generatio...

A lot of the reviews of this short book which is taken from a group of lectures seem to be grumpy about the conclusions or miss the argument. Ferguson is a great historian (I loved the Ascent of Money for its breadth). This book suggests that four institutions are critical to what the founders called " happiness." He argues that each is in a state of decline and concludes those declines have long term consequences. Institutions are key to economic growth - he names four democracy, capitalism, th...

One of the most interesting books I've read in recent years was Niall Ferguson's Civilization: The West and the Rest, an examination of the extraordinary rise of Western Civilization relative to the rest of the world and the causes that seem to be at the root of its apparent decline. Ferguson's newest book--The Great Degeneration: How Institutions Decay and Economies Die--continues that examination, looking at why rich countries, as he puts it, "lose their way."With a page count a bit lower than...

Eloquent writing, but advocate a utopian community better suited for early American, or Australian societies. Expected much more than an expanded speech converted into a book.

Why Nations FailFerguson tells us that according to Adam Smith himself, countries can be said to have arrived at the “stationary state” when their ‘laws and institutions’ degenerate to the point that elite rent-seeking dominates the economic and political process. The book makes a case that this is how it is in the Western world today. To illustrate this, Ferguson chooses four important sectors and examines them and shows that each of them is degenerating. There is of course an implicit assumpti...