At the
start of the third Christian millenium we are aware of massive political,
economic and ideological changes which condition the chances for liberty,
wealth and equality. Yet it is surprisingly difficult for us to understand
these forces, for we cannot see what surrounds us so closely. This book
stands back from our predicament in order to discover some of the pressures
which have made the development of human civilizations in the past so
slow and then what has radically altered slmost every feature of human
experience in the last 300 years. It does so through the study of four
great thinkers who lived between 1689 and 1994: Montesquieu, Adam Smith,
Tocqueville and Ernest Gellner. By weaving their lives together and
through detailed use of their own words we can see how they approached
these large questions. Through them we can begin to understand how we
are shaped and what conditions our future.
Contents
1 The Riddle
of the Modern World
I Liberty
2 Baron
de Montesquieu's Life and Vision
3 Liberty
and Despotism
4 The Defence
of Liberty
II Wealth
5 Adam
Smith's Life and Vision
6 Growth
and Stasis
7 Of Wealth
and Liberty
8 From
Predation to Production
III
Equality
9 Alexis
de Tocqueville's Life and Vision
10 'America'
as a Thought Experiment
11 How
the Modern World Emerged
12 Liberty,
Wealth and Equality
IV An
Answer to the Riddle?
13 Ernest
Gellner and the Conditions of the Exit
14 The
Riddle Resolved?