The Road to Serfdom
Encyclopedia
The Road to Serfdom is a book written by the Austrian-born economist
and philosopher Friedrich von Hayek
(1899–1992) between 1940–1943, in which he "warned of the danger of tyranny that inevitably results from government control of economic decision-making through central planning
," and in which he argues that the abandonment of individualism
, classical liberalism
, and freedom
inevitably leads to socialist or fascist oppression and tyranny and the serfdom
of the individual. Significantly, Hayek challenged the general view among British academics that fascism
was a capitalist reaction against socialism, instead arguing that fascism and socialism had common roots in central economic planning and the power of the state over the individual.
The Road to Serfdom is among the most influential and popular expositions of market libertarianism
and remains a popular and influential work in contemporary discourse, selling over two million copies, and remaining a best-seller.
The Road to Serfdom was to be the popular edition of the second volume of Hayek’s treatise entitled “The Abuse and Decline of Reason,” and the title was inspired by the writings of the 19th century French classical liberal thinker Alexis de Tocqueville
on the “road to servitude.” The book was first published in Britain by Routledge
in March 1944, during World War II
, and was quite popular, leading Hayek to call it “that unobtainable book,” also due in part to wartime paper rationing. It was published in the United States by the University of Chicago Press
in September 1944 and achieved great popularity. At the arrangement of editor Max Eastman
, the American magazine Reader's Digest
published an abridged version in April 1945, enabling The Road to Serfdom to reach a wider popular audience beyond academics.
The Road to Serfdom has had a significant impact on twentieth century conservative and libertarian economic and political discourse and is often cited today by commentators.
in September 1944. The U.S. publisher’s expectation was that the book would sell between 900 and 3,000 copies. The initial printing run of 2,000 copies was quickly sold out, and 30,000 copies were sold within six months. , the University of Chicago Press estimated that more than 350,000 copies had been sold.
A condensed version of the book written by Max Eastman was then published as the lead article in the April 1945 issue of Reader's Digest
, with a press run of several million copies. This condensed version was then offered as a Book of the Month selection with a press run of over 600,000 copies. In February 1945 a picture-book version was published in Look magazine
, later made into a pamphlet
and distributed by General Motors
. The book has been translated into approximately 20 languages and is dedicated to “The socialists
of all parties
.” The introduction to the 50th anniversary edition is written by Milton Friedman
(another recipient of the Nobel Prize in Economics 1976).
In 2007, the University of Chicago Press
issued a “Definitive Edition”, Volume 2 in the “Collected Works of F. A. Hayek” series. In June 2010, the book achieved new popularity by rising to the top of the Amazon.com
best seller list following extended coverage of the book on The Glenn Beck Program.
Centralized planning is inherently undemocratic, because it requires "that the will of a small minority be imposed upon the people..." The power of these minorities to act by taking money or property in pursuit of centralized goals, destroys the Rule of Law and individual freedoms. Where there is centralized planning, "the individual would more than ever become a mere means, to be used by the authority in the service of such abstractions as the 'social welfare' or the 'good of the community'". Even the very poor have more personal freedom in an open society than a centrally planned one. "[W]hile the last resort of a competitive economy is the bailiff
, the ultimate sanction of a planned economy is the hangman." Socialism is a hypocritical system, because its professed humanitarian goals can only be put into practice by brutal methods "of which most socialists disapprove". Such centralized systems also require effective propaganda, so that the people come to believe that the state's goals are theirs.
Hayek analyzes the roots of Nazism in socialism, then draws parallels to the thought of British leaders:
Hayek believed that after World War II, "wisdom in the management of our economic affairs will be even more important than before and that the fate of our civilization will ultimately depend on how we solve the economic problems we shall then face". The only chance to build a decent world is "to improve the general level of wealth" via the activities of free markets. He saw international organization as involving a further threat to individual freedom. He concluded: "The guiding principle that a policy of freedom for the individual is the only truly progressive policy remains as true today as it was in the nineteenth century."
said "The book clearly and logically explained how any form of central government planning eventually leads to serfdom (or servitude) and extinguishes freedom."
Although Hayek believed that government intervention in markets would lead to a loss of freedom, he recognized a limited role for government to perform tasks of which free markets were not capable:
While Hayek is opposed to regulations which restrict the freedom to enter a trade, or to buy and sell at any price, or to control quantities, he acknowledges the utility of regulations which restrict allowed methods of production, so long as these are applied equally to everyone and not used as an indirect way of controlling prices or quantities, and without forgetting the cost of such restrictions:
He notes that there are certain areas, such as the environment, where activities which cause damage to third parties (known to economists as "negative externalities") cannot effectively be regulated solely by the marketplace:
The government also has a role in preventing fraud:
The government also has a role in creating a safety net:
He concludes: "In no system that could be rationally defended would the state just do nothing."
said of it: "In my opinion it is a grand book...Morally and philosophically I find myself in agreement with virtually the whole of it: and not only in agreement with it, but in deeply moved agreement." Having said that, Keynes did not think Hayek's philosophy was of practical use; this was explained later in the same letter, through the following comment: "What we need therefore, in my opinion, is not a change in our economic programmes, which would only lead in practice to disillusion with the results of your philosophy; but perhaps even the contrary, namely, an enlargement of them. Your greatest danger is the probable practical failure of the application of your philosophy in the United States."
George Orwell
responded with both praise and criticism, stating, "in the negative part of Professor Hayek's thesis there is a great deal of truth. It cannot be said too often — at any rate, it is not being said nearly often enough — that collectivism is not inherently democratic, but, on the contrary, gives to a tyrannical minority such powers as the Spanish Inquisitors never dreamt of." Yet he also warned, "[A] return to 'free' competition means for the great mass of people a tyranny probably worse, because more irresponsible, than that of the state."
Hayek's work was influential enough to warrant mention during the 1945 British general election
, when according to Harold Macmillan
, Winston Churchill
was "fortified in his apprehensions [of a Labour
government] by reading Professor Hayek's The Road to Serfdom" when he warned in an election broadcast in 1945 that a socialist system would "have to fall back on some form of Gestapo
." The Labour leader Clement Attlee
responded in his election broadcast by claiming that what Churchill had said was the "second-hand version of the academic views of an Austrian professor, Friedrich August von Hayek." The Conservative Central Office sacrificed 1.5 tons of their precious paper ration allocated for the 1945 election so that more copies of The Road to Serfdom could be printed, although to no avail, as Labour won a landslide victory.
The Road to Serfdom was placed fourth on the list of the 100 best non-fiction books of the twentieth century compiled by National Review
magazine. It also made #16 in reader selections of the hundred best non-fiction book of the twentieth century administered by Modern Library
.
The Road to Serfdom appears on Martin Seymour-Smith
's list of the 100 Most Influential Books Ever Written
, whilst it made #1 on Human Events: Top Ten Books Every Republican Congressman Should Read in 2006.
Milton Friedman's assessment:
Alan Brinkley
's assessment:
made a case diametrically opposed to Hayek, arguing that unfettered markets had undermined the social order and that economic breakdown had paved the way for the emergence of dictatorship.
Herman Finer
, a Fabian
socialist, published a rebuttal in his The Road to Reaction in 1946. Hayek called Finer's book "a specimen of abuse and invective which is probably unique in contemporary academic discussion."
Barbara Wootton wrote Freedom under Planning after reading an early copy of The Road to Serfdom and claimed "Much of what I have written is devoted to criticism of the views put forward by Professor Hayek in this and other books." However, Frank Knight
, founder of the Chicago School of Economics
, wrote in a scholarly review of the Wootton book: "Let me repeat that the Wootton book is in no logical sense an answer to The Road to Serfdom, whatever may be thought of the cogency of Hayek's argument, or the soundness of his position."
In his review (collected in The Present as History, 1953) Marxist
Paul Sweezy
joked that Hayek would have you believe that if there was an over-production of baby carriages, the central planners would then order the population to have more babies instead of simply warehousing the temporary excess of carriages and decreasing production for next year. The cybernetic
arguments of Stafford Beer in his 1974 CBC Massey Lectures, Designing Freedom—that intelligent adaptive planning can increase freedom—are of interest in this regard, as is the technical work of Herbert Simon
and Albert Ando
on the dynamics of hierarchical nearly decomposable systems in economics—namely, that everything in such a system is not tightly coupled to everything else.
Jeffrey Sachs wrote that the social-welfare states, with high rates of taxation and social outlays, outperform the relatively free-market economies, according to the empirical evidence. William Easterly
wrote a rebuttal and Sachs wrote a re-rebuttal.
Eric Zencey
wrote that the free market economy Hayek advocated is designed for an infinite planet, and when it runs into physical limits (as any growing system must), the result is a need for centralized planning to mediate the problematic interface of economy and nature. "Planning is planning, whether it's done to minimize poverty and injustice, as socialists were advocating then, or to preserve the minimum flow of ecosystem services that civilization requires, as we are finding increasingly necessary today."
/anarcho-capitalist
economist Walter Block
has observed critically that while the The Road to Serfdom makes a strong case against centrally planned economies, it appears only lukewarm in its support of a free market
system and laissez-faire
capitalism
, with Hayek even going so far as to say that "probably nothing has done so much harm to the liberal cause as the wooden insistence of some liberals on certain rules of thumb, above all the principle of laissez-faire capitalism." In the book, Hayek writes that the government has a role to play in the economy through the monetary system (a view that he later withdrew), work-hours regulation, social welfare, and institutions for the flow of proper information. Through analysis of this and many other of Hayek's works, Block asserts that: "in making the case against socialism, Hayek was led into making all sort of compromises with what otherwise appeared to be his own philosophical perspective—so much so, that if a system was erected on the basis of them, it would not differ too sharply from what this author explicitly opposed."
Gordon Tullock
has argued Hayek's analysis predicted totalitarian governments in much of Europe in the late 20th century. He uses Sweden, in which the government at that time controlled 63 percent of GNP
, as an example to support his argument that the basic problem with The Road to Serfdom is "that it offered predictions which turned out to be false. The steady advance of government in places such as Sweden has not led to any loss of non-economic freedoms." While criticizing Hayek, Tullock still praises the classical liberal notion of economic freedom, saying, "Arguments for political freedom are strong, as are the arguments for economic freedom. We needn’t make one set of arguments depend on the other." However, according to Robert Skidelsky, Hayek "safeguarded himself from such retrospective refutation." Skidelsky argues that Hayek's argument was contingent, and that, "By the 1970s there was some evidence of the slippery slope…and then there was Thatcher
. Hayek's warning played a critical part in her determination to 'roll back the state.'"
Economist
An economist is a professional in the social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy...
and philosopher Friedrich von Hayek
Friedrich Hayek
Friedrich August Hayek CH , born in Austria-Hungary as Friedrich August von Hayek, was an economist and philosopher best known for his defense of classical liberalism and free-market capitalism against socialist and collectivist thought...
(1899–1992) between 1940–1943, in which he "warned of the danger of tyranny that inevitably results from government control of economic decision-making through central planning
Planned economy
A planned economy is an economic system in which decisions regarding production and investment are embodied in a plan formulated by a central authority, usually by a government agency...
," and in which he argues that the abandonment of individualism
Individualism
Individualism is the moral stance, political philosophy, ideology, or social outlook that stresses "the moral worth of the individual". Individualists promote the exercise of one's goals and desires and so value independence and self-reliance while opposing most external interference upon one's own...
, classical liberalism
Classical liberalism
Classical liberalism is the philosophy committed to the ideal of limited government, constitutionalism, rule of law, due process, and liberty of individuals including freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and free markets....
, and freedom
Economic freedom
Economic freedom is a term used in economic and policy debates. As with freedom generally, there are various definitions, but no universally accepted concept of economic freedom...
inevitably leads to socialist or fascist oppression and tyranny and the serfdom
Serfdom
Serfdom is the status of peasants under feudalism, specifically relating to Manorialism. It was a condition of bondage or modified slavery which developed primarily during the High Middle Ages in Europe and lasted to the mid-19th century...
of the individual. Significantly, Hayek challenged the general view among British academics that fascism
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
was a capitalist reaction against socialism, instead arguing that fascism and socialism had common roots in central economic planning and the power of the state over the individual.
The Road to Serfdom is among the most influential and popular expositions of market libertarianism
Libertarianism
Libertarianism, in the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view...
and remains a popular and influential work in contemporary discourse, selling over two million copies, and remaining a best-seller.
The Road to Serfdom was to be the popular edition of the second volume of Hayek’s treatise entitled “The Abuse and Decline of Reason,” and the title was inspired by the writings of the 19th century French classical liberal thinker Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville was a French political thinker and historian best known for his Democracy in America and The Old Regime and the Revolution . In both of these works, he explored the effects of the rising equality of social conditions on the individual and the state in...
on the “road to servitude.” The book was first published in Britain by Routledge
Routledge
Routledge is a British publishing house which has operated under a succession of company names and latterly as an academic imprint. Its origins may be traced back to the 19th-century London bookseller George Routledge...
in March 1944, during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, and was quite popular, leading Hayek to call it “that unobtainable book,” also due in part to wartime paper rationing. It was published in the United States by the University of Chicago Press
University of Chicago Press
The University of Chicago Press is the largest university press in the United States. It is operated by the University of Chicago and publishes a wide variety of academic titles, including The Chicago Manual of Style, dozens of academic journals, including Critical Inquiry, and a wide array of...
in September 1944 and achieved great popularity. At the arrangement of editor Max Eastman
Max Eastman
Max Forrester Eastman was an American writer on literature, philosophy and society, a poet, and a prominent political activist. For many years, Eastman was a supporter of socialism, a leading patron of the Harlem Renaissance and an activist for a number of liberal and radical causes...
, the American magazine Reader's Digest
Reader's Digest
Reader's Digest is a general interest family magazine, published ten times annually. Formerly based in Chappaqua, New York, its headquarters is now in New York City. It was founded in 1922, by DeWitt Wallace and Lila Bell Wallace...
published an abridged version in April 1945, enabling The Road to Serfdom to reach a wider popular audience beyond academics.
The Road to Serfdom has had a significant impact on twentieth century conservative and libertarian economic and political discourse and is often cited today by commentators.
Publication
The book was originally published for a British audience by Routledge Press in March 1944 in the United Kingdom and then by the University of Chicago PressUniversity of Chicago Press
The University of Chicago Press is the largest university press in the United States. It is operated by the University of Chicago and publishes a wide variety of academic titles, including The Chicago Manual of Style, dozens of academic journals, including Critical Inquiry, and a wide array of...
in September 1944. The U.S. publisher’s expectation was that the book would sell between 900 and 3,000 copies. The initial printing run of 2,000 copies was quickly sold out, and 30,000 copies were sold within six months. , the University of Chicago Press estimated that more than 350,000 copies had been sold.
A condensed version of the book written by Max Eastman was then published as the lead article in the April 1945 issue of Reader's Digest
Reader's Digest
Reader's Digest is a general interest family magazine, published ten times annually. Formerly based in Chappaqua, New York, its headquarters is now in New York City. It was founded in 1922, by DeWitt Wallace and Lila Bell Wallace...
, with a press run of several million copies. This condensed version was then offered as a Book of the Month selection with a press run of over 600,000 copies. In February 1945 a picture-book version was published in Look magazine
Look (American magazine)
Look was a bi-weekly, general-interest magazine published in Des Moines, Iowa from 1937 to 1971, with more of an emphasis on photographs than articles...
, later made into a pamphlet
Pamphlet
A pamphlet is an unbound booklet . It may consist of a single sheet of paper that is printed on both sides and folded in half, in thirds, or in fourths , or it may consist of a few pages that are folded in half and saddle stapled at the crease to make a simple book...
and distributed by General Motors
General Motors
General Motors Company , commonly known as GM, formerly incorporated as General Motors Corporation, is an American multinational automotive corporation headquartered in Detroit, Michigan and the world's second-largest automaker in 2010...
. The book has been translated into approximately 20 languages and is dedicated to “The socialists
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...
of all parties
Political party
A political party is a political organization that typically seeks to influence government policy, usually by nominating their own candidates and trying to seat them in political office. Parties participate in electoral campaigns, educational outreach or protest actions...
.” The introduction to the 50th anniversary edition is written by Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman was an American economist, statistician, academic, and author who taught at the University of Chicago for more than three decades...
(another recipient of the Nobel Prize in Economics 1976).
In 2007, the University of Chicago Press
University of Chicago Press
The University of Chicago Press is the largest university press in the United States. It is operated by the University of Chicago and publishes a wide variety of academic titles, including The Chicago Manual of Style, dozens of academic journals, including Critical Inquiry, and a wide array of...
issued a “Definitive Edition”, Volume 2 in the “Collected Works of F. A. Hayek” series. In June 2010, the book achieved new popularity by rising to the top of the Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
best seller list following extended coverage of the book on The Glenn Beck Program.
Summary
Hayek argues that Western democracies, including the United Kingdom and the United States, have “progressively abandoned that freedom in economic affairs without which personal and political freedom has never existed in the past.” Society has mistakenly tried to ensure continuing prosperity by centralized planning, which inevitably leads to totalitarianism. “We have in effect undertaken to dispense with the forces which produced unforeseen results and to replace the impersonal and anonymous mechanism of the market by collective and ‘conscious’ direction of all social forces to deliberately chosen goals.” Socialism, while presented as a means of assuring equality, does so through “restraint and servitude”, while “democracy seeks equality in liberty”. Planning, because coercive, is an inferior method of regulation, while the cooperation of a free market is superior “because it is the only method by which our activities can be adjusted to each other without coercive or arbitrary intervention of authority”.Centralized planning is inherently undemocratic, because it requires "that the will of a small minority be imposed upon the people..." The power of these minorities to act by taking money or property in pursuit of centralized goals, destroys the Rule of Law and individual freedoms. Where there is centralized planning, "the individual would more than ever become a mere means, to be used by the authority in the service of such abstractions as the 'social welfare' or the 'good of the community'". Even the very poor have more personal freedom in an open society than a centrally planned one. "[W]hile the last resort of a competitive economy is the bailiff
Bailiff
A bailiff is a governor or custodian ; a legal officer to whom some degree of authority, care or jurisdiction is committed...
, the ultimate sanction of a planned economy is the hangman." Socialism is a hypocritical system, because its professed humanitarian goals can only be put into practice by brutal methods "of which most socialists disapprove". Such centralized systems also require effective propaganda, so that the people come to believe that the state's goals are theirs.
Hayek analyzes the roots of Nazism in socialism, then draws parallels to the thought of British leaders:
The increasing veneration for the state, the admiration of power, and of bigness for bigness' sake, the enthusiasm for "organization" of everything (we now call it "planning") and that "inability to leave anything to the simple power of organic growth"...are all scarcely less marked in England now than they were in Germany.
Hayek believed that after World War II, "wisdom in the management of our economic affairs will be even more important than before and that the fate of our civilization will ultimately depend on how we solve the economic problems we shall then face". The only chance to build a decent world is "to improve the general level of wealth" via the activities of free markets. He saw international organization as involving a further threat to individual freedom. He concluded: "The guiding principle that a policy of freedom for the individual is the only truly progressive policy remains as true today as it was in the nineteenth century."
A role for government
The Road To Serfdom is often cited today by politicians and media commentators for the proposition that government should not intervene at all in free markets; for example, Glenn BeckGlenn Beck
Glenn Edward Lee Beck is an American conservative radio host, vlogger, author, entrepreneur, political commentator and former television host. He hosts the Glenn Beck Program, a nationally syndicated talk-radio show that airs throughout the United States on Premiere Radio Networks...
said "The book clearly and logically explained how any form of central government planning eventually leads to serfdom (or servitude) and extinguishes freedom."
Although Hayek believed that government intervention in markets would lead to a loss of freedom, he recognized a limited role for government to perform tasks of which free markets were not capable:
The successful use of competition as the principle of social organization precludes certain types of coercive interference with economic life, but it admits of others which sometimes may very considerably assist its work and even requires certain kinds of government action.
While Hayek is opposed to regulations which restrict the freedom to enter a trade, or to buy and sell at any price, or to control quantities, he acknowledges the utility of regulations which restrict allowed methods of production, so long as these are applied equally to everyone and not used as an indirect way of controlling prices or quantities, and without forgetting the cost of such restrictions:
To prohibit the use of certain poisonous substances, or to require special precautions in their use, to limit working hours or to require certain sanitary arrangements, is fully compatible with the preservation of competition. The only question here is whether in the particular instance the advantages gained are greater than the social costs which they impose.
He notes that there are certain areas, such as the environment, where activities which cause damage to third parties (known to economists as "negative externalities") cannot effectively be regulated solely by the marketplace:
Nor can certain harmful effects of deforestation, of some methods of farming, or of the smoke and noise of factories, be confined to the owner of the property in question, or to those who are willing to submit to the damage for an agreed compensation.
The government also has a role in preventing fraud:
Even the most essential prerequisite of its [the market's] proper functioning, the prevention of fraud and deception (including exploitation of ignorance), provides a great and by no means fully accomplished object of legislative activity.
The government also has a role in creating a safety net:
There is no reason why, in a society which has reached the general level of wealth ours has, the first kind of security should not be guaranteed to all without endangering general freedom; that is: some minimum of food, shelter and clothing, sufficient to preserve health. Nor is there any reason why the state should not help to organize a comprehensive system of social insurance in providing for those common hazards of life against which few can make adequate provision.
He concludes: "In no system that could be rationally defended would the state just do nothing."
Contemporary commentary
John Maynard KeynesJohn Maynard Keynes
John Maynard Keynes, Baron Keynes of Tilton, CB FBA , was a British economist whose ideas have profoundly affected the theory and practice of modern macroeconomics, as well as the economic policies of governments...
said of it: "In my opinion it is a grand book...Morally and philosophically I find myself in agreement with virtually the whole of it: and not only in agreement with it, but in deeply moved agreement." Having said that, Keynes did not think Hayek's philosophy was of practical use; this was explained later in the same letter, through the following comment: "What we need therefore, in my opinion, is not a change in our economic programmes, which would only lead in practice to disillusion with the results of your philosophy; but perhaps even the contrary, namely, an enlargement of them. Your greatest danger is the probable practical failure of the application of your philosophy in the United States."
George Orwell
George Orwell
Eric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...
responded with both praise and criticism, stating, "in the negative part of Professor Hayek's thesis there is a great deal of truth. It cannot be said too often — at any rate, it is not being said nearly often enough — that collectivism is not inherently democratic, but, on the contrary, gives to a tyrannical minority such powers as the Spanish Inquisitors never dreamt of." Yet he also warned, "[A] return to 'free' competition means for the great mass of people a tyranny probably worse, because more irresponsible, than that of the state."
Hayek's work was influential enough to warrant mention during the 1945 British general election
United Kingdom general election, 1945
The United Kingdom general election of 1945 was a general election held on 5 July 1945, with polls in some constituencies delayed until 12 July and in Nelson and Colne until 19 July, due to local wakes weeks. The results were counted and declared on 26 July, due in part to the time it took to...
, when according to Harold Macmillan
Harold Macmillan
Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC was Conservative Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 10 January 1957 to 18 October 1963....
, Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
was "fortified in his apprehensions [of a Labour
Labour Party (UK)
The Labour Party is a centre-left democratic socialist party in the United Kingdom. It surpassed the Liberal Party in general elections during the early 1920s, forming minority governments under Ramsay MacDonald in 1924 and 1929-1931. The party was in a wartime coalition from 1940 to 1945, after...
government] by reading Professor Hayek's The Road to Serfdom" when he warned in an election broadcast in 1945 that a socialist system would "have to fall back on some form of Gestapo
Gestapo
The Gestapo was the official secret police of Nazi Germany. Beginning on 20 April 1934, it was under the administration of the SS leader Heinrich Himmler in his position as Chief of German Police...
." The Labour leader Clement Attlee
Clement Attlee
Clement Richard Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee, KG, OM, CH, PC, FRS was a British Labour politician who served as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1945 to 1951, and as the Leader of the Labour Party from 1935 to 1955...
responded in his election broadcast by claiming that what Churchill had said was the "second-hand version of the academic views of an Austrian professor, Friedrich August von Hayek." The Conservative Central Office sacrificed 1.5 tons of their precious paper ration allocated for the 1945 election so that more copies of The Road to Serfdom could be printed, although to no avail, as Labour won a landslide victory.
The Road to Serfdom was placed fourth on the list of the 100 best non-fiction books of the twentieth century compiled by National Review
National Review
National Review is a biweekly magazine founded by the late author William F. Buckley, Jr., in 1955 and based in New York City. It describes itself as "America's most widely read and influential magazine and web site for conservative news, commentary, and opinion."Although the print version of the...
magazine. It also made #16 in reader selections of the hundred best non-fiction book of the twentieth century administered by Modern Library
Modern Library
The Modern Library is a publishing company. Founded in 1917 by Albert Boni and Horace Liveright as an imprint of their publishing company Boni & Liveright, it was purchased in 1925 by Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer...
.
The Road to Serfdom appears on Martin Seymour-Smith
Martin Seymour-Smith
Martin Roger Seymour-Smith was a British poet, literary critic, biographer and astrologer.Seymour-Smith was born in London and educated at Oxford University where he was editor of Isis...
's list of the 100 Most Influential Books Ever Written
100 Most Influential Books Ever Written
The 100 Most Influential Books Ever Written: The History of Thought from Ancient Times to Today is a book of intellectual history written by Martin Seymour-Smith, a British poet, critic, and biographer.-Chronological list:...
, whilst it made #1 on Human Events: Top Ten Books Every Republican Congressman Should Read in 2006.
Milton Friedman's assessment:
"I think the Adam Smith role was played in this cycle [i.e. the late twentieth century collapse of socialism in which the idea of free-markets succeeded first, and then special events catalyzed a complete change of socio-political policy in countries around the world] by Friedrich Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom."
Alan Brinkley
Alan Brinkley
Alan Brinkley is the Allan Nevins Professor of History at Columbia University, where he was also Provost 2003–2009. He was denied tenure at Harvard University in 1986 despite being an award-winning teacher. He lives in New York City with his wife, Evangeline, daughter Elly, and dog Jessie...
's assessment:
The publication of two books.. helped to galvanize the concerns that were beginning to emerge among intellectuals (and many others) about the implications of totalitarianism. One was James Burnham’s The Managerial Revolution.. [A second] Friedrich A. Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom.. was far more controversial — and influential. Even more than Burnham, Hayek forced into public discourse the question of the compatibility of democracy and statism.. In responding to Burnham and Hayek.. liberals [in the statist sense of this term as used by some in the United States] were in fact responding to a powerful strain of Jeffersonian anti-statism in American political culture.. The result was a subtle but important shift in liberal [i.e. American statist] thinking."
Criticism
The Road To Serfdom has been criticized on theoretical grounds. Economic sociologist Karl PolanyiKarl Polanyi
Karl Paul Polanyi was a Hungarian philosopher, political economist and economic anthropologist known for his opposition to traditional economic thought and his book The Great Transformation...
made a case diametrically opposed to Hayek, arguing that unfettered markets had undermined the social order and that economic breakdown had paved the way for the emergence of dictatorship.
Herman Finer
Herman Finer
Herman Finer was a Bessarabian-born British political scientist and Fabian socialist. He taught for many years at the University of Chicago...
, a Fabian
Fabian Society
The Fabian Society is a British socialist movement, whose purpose is to advance the principles of democratic socialism via gradualist and reformist, rather than revolutionary, means. It is best known for its initial ground-breaking work beginning late in the 19th century and continuing up to World...
socialist, published a rebuttal in his The Road to Reaction in 1946. Hayek called Finer's book "a specimen of abuse and invective which is probably unique in contemporary academic discussion."
Barbara Wootton wrote Freedom under Planning after reading an early copy of The Road to Serfdom and claimed "Much of what I have written is devoted to criticism of the views put forward by Professor Hayek in this and other books." However, Frank Knight
Frank Knight
Frank Hyneman Knight was an American economist who spent most of his career at the University of Chicago, where he became one of the founders of the Chicago school. Nobel laureates James M. Buchanan, Milton Friedman and George Stigler were all students of Knight at Chicago. Knight supervised...
, founder of the Chicago School of Economics
Chicago school (economics)
The Chicago school of economics describes a neoclassical school of thought within the academic community of economists, with a strong focus around the faculty of The University of Chicago, some of whom have constructed and popularized its principles...
, wrote in a scholarly review of the Wootton book: "Let me repeat that the Wootton book is in no logical sense an answer to The Road to Serfdom, whatever may be thought of the cogency of Hayek's argument, or the soundness of his position."
In his review (collected in The Present as History, 1953) Marxist
Marxism
Marxism is an economic and sociopolitical worldview and method of socioeconomic inquiry that centers upon a materialist interpretation of history, a dialectical view of social change, and an analysis and critique of the development of capitalism. Marxism was pioneered in the early to mid 19th...
Paul Sweezy
Paul Sweezy
Paul Marlor Sweezy was a Marxist economist, political activist, publisher, and founding editor of the long-running magazine Monthly Review...
joked that Hayek would have you believe that if there was an over-production of baby carriages, the central planners would then order the population to have more babies instead of simply warehousing the temporary excess of carriages and decreasing production for next year. The cybernetic
Cybernetics
Cybernetics is the interdisciplinary study of the structure of regulatory systems. Cybernetics is closely related to information theory, control theory and systems theory, at least in its first-order form...
arguments of Stafford Beer in his 1974 CBC Massey Lectures, Designing Freedom—that intelligent adaptive planning can increase freedom—are of interest in this regard, as is the technical work of Herbert Simon
Herbert Simon
Herbert Alexander Simon was an American political scientist, economist, sociologist, and psychologist, and professor—most notably at Carnegie Mellon University—whose research ranged across the fields of cognitive psychology, cognitive science, computer science, public administration, economics,...
and Albert Ando
Albert Ando
Albert K. Ando was a Japanese-born economist.He came to the United States after World War II. He received his B.S. in economics from the University of Seattle in 1951, his M.A. in economics from St. Louis University in 1953, and an M.S. in economics in 1956 and a Ph.D...
on the dynamics of hierarchical nearly decomposable systems in economics—namely, that everything in such a system is not tightly coupled to everything else.
Jeffrey Sachs wrote that the social-welfare states, with high rates of taxation and social outlays, outperform the relatively free-market economies, according to the empirical evidence. William Easterly
William Easterly
William Russell Easterly is an American economist, specializing in economic growth and foreign aid. He is a Professor of Economics at New York University, joint with Africa House, and Co-Director of NYU’s Development Research Institute. He is also a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings...
wrote a rebuttal and Sachs wrote a re-rebuttal.
Eric Zencey
Eric Zencey
Eric Zencey is an American author of two books.Panama is an historical novel set in Paris in 1893, in which the American historian Henry Adams becomes entangled in the Panama scandals, the scandals and political crisis that befell France as a consequence of the bankruptcy of the French Panama...
wrote that the free market economy Hayek advocated is designed for an infinite planet, and when it runs into physical limits (as any growing system must), the result is a need for centralized planning to mediate the problematic interface of economy and nature. "Planning is planning, whether it's done to minimize poverty and injustice, as socialists were advocating then, or to preserve the minimum flow of ecosystem services that civilization requires, as we are finding increasingly necessary today."
Libertarian/Conservative critics
Mises Institute libertarianLibertarianism
Libertarianism, in the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view...
/anarcho-capitalist
Anarcho-capitalism
Anarcho-capitalism is a libertarian and individualist anarchist political philosophy that advocates the elimination of the state in favour of individual sovereignty in a free market...
economist Walter Block
Walter Block
Walter Edward Block is a free market economist and anarcho-capitalist associated with the Austrian School of economics.-Personal history and education:...
has observed critically that while the The Road to Serfdom makes a strong case against centrally planned economies, it appears only lukewarm in its support of a free market
Free market
A free market is a competitive market where prices are determined by supply and demand. However, the term is also commonly used for markets in which economic intervention and regulation by the state is limited to tax collection, and enforcement of private ownership and contracts...
system and laissez-faire
Laissez-faire
In economics, laissez-faire describes an environment in which transactions between private parties are free from state intervention, including restrictive regulations, taxes, tariffs and enforced monopolies....
capitalism
Capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system that became dominant in the Western world following the demise of feudalism. There is no consensus on the precise definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category...
, with Hayek even going so far as to say that "probably nothing has done so much harm to the liberal cause as the wooden insistence of some liberals on certain rules of thumb, above all the principle of laissez-faire capitalism." In the book, Hayek writes that the government has a role to play in the economy through the monetary system (a view that he later withdrew), work-hours regulation, social welfare, and institutions for the flow of proper information. Through analysis of this and many other of Hayek's works, Block asserts that: "in making the case against socialism, Hayek was led into making all sort of compromises with what otherwise appeared to be his own philosophical perspective—so much so, that if a system was erected on the basis of them, it would not differ too sharply from what this author explicitly opposed."
Gordon Tullock
Gordon Tullock
Gordon Tullock is an economist and retired Professor of Law and Economics at the George Mason University School of Law. He is best known for his work on public choice theory, the application of economic thinking to political issues...
has argued Hayek's analysis predicted totalitarian governments in much of Europe in the late 20th century. He uses Sweden, in which the government at that time controlled 63 percent of GNP
GNP
Gross National Product is the market value of all products and services produced in one year by labor and property supplied by the residents of a country...
, as an example to support his argument that the basic problem with The Road to Serfdom is "that it offered predictions which turned out to be false. The steady advance of government in places such as Sweden has not led to any loss of non-economic freedoms." While criticizing Hayek, Tullock still praises the classical liberal notion of economic freedom, saying, "Arguments for political freedom are strong, as are the arguments for economic freedom. We needn’t make one set of arguments depend on the other." However, according to Robert Skidelsky, Hayek "safeguarded himself from such retrospective refutation." Skidelsky argues that Hayek's argument was contingent, and that, "By the 1970s there was some evidence of the slippery slope…and then there was Thatcher
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990...
. Hayek's warning played a critical part in her determination to 'roll back the state.'"
See also
- Criticisms of communismCriticisms of communismCriticism of communism can be divided into two broad categories: those concerning themselves with the practical aspects of 20th century Communist states, and those concerning themselves with communist principles and theory....
- Criticisms of socialismCriticisms of socialismCriticism of socialism refers to a critique of socialist models of economic organization, their efficiency and feasibility; as well as the political and social implications of such a system. Some criticisms are not directed toward socialism as a system, but are directed toward the socialist...
- Economic calculation problemEconomic calculation problemThe economic calculation problem is a criticism of central economic planning. It was first proposed by Ludwig von Mises in 1920 and later expounded by Friedrich Hayek. The problem referred to is that of how to distribute resources rationally in an economy...
- New classNew classThe "New Class" model, as a theory of new social groups in post-industrial societies, gained ascendency during the 1970s as social and political scientists noted how "New Class" groups were shaped by post-material orientations in their pursuit of political and social goals...
- NomenklaturaNomenklaturaThe nomenklatura were a category of people within the Soviet Union and other Eastern Bloc countries who held various key administrative positions in all spheres of those countries' activity: government, industry, agriculture, education, etc., whose positions were granted only with approval by the...
- Individualism and Economic OrderIndividualism and Economic OrderIndividualism and Economic Order is a book written by Friedrich Hayek . It is a collection of essays originally published between the 1930s and 40s, discussing topics ranging from moral philosophy to the methods of the social sciences and economic theory to contrast free markets with planned...
- Law, Legislation and LibertyLaw, Legislation and LibertyLaw, Legislation and Liberty is the 1973 magnum opus in three volumes by Nobel laureate economist and political philosopher Friedrich Hayek. In it, Hayek further develops the philosophical principles he discussed earlier in The Road to Serfdom, The Constitution of Liberty, and other writings...
- The Black Book of CommunismThe Black Book of CommunismThe Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression is a book authored by several European academics and edited by Stéphane Courtois, which describes a history of repressions, both political and civilian, by Communist states, including genocides, extrajudicial executions, deportations, and...
- The Constitution of LibertyThe Constitution of LibertyThe Constitution of Liberty is a book by Austrian economist and Nobel Prize recipient Friedrich A. Hayek. The book was first published in 1960 by the University of Chicago Press and it is an interpretation of civilization as being made possible by the fundamental principles of liberty, which the...
- The Fatal ConceitThe Fatal ConceitThe Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism is a non-fiction book written by the economist and political philosopher Friedrich Hayek and edited by William Warren Bartley.-Main thesis and arguments:...
- Omnipotent GovernmentOmnipotent GovernmentOmnipotent Government: The Rise of the Total State and Total War is a book by Austrian School economist Ludwig von Mises first published in 1944 by Yale University Press. It is one of the most influential writings in Right-libertarian social thought and critique of statist ideology and socialism,...