Thinking the 20th Century - Revision history

Marcin: /* Notes */

2025-01-12T12:20:45Z

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			*the politics of social cohesion based around collective purposes versus the erosion of society by the politics of fear.
	*They achieved something which, as late as the 1930s, seemed almost inconceivable: they forged strong, high-taxing and actively interventionist democratic and constitutional states which could encompass complex mass societies without resorting to violence or repression. We would be foolish to abandon this heritage carelessly.		*They achieved something which, as late as the 1930s, seemed almost inconceivable: they forged strong, high-taxing and actively interventionist democratic and constitutional states which could encompass complex mass societies without resorting to violence or repression. We would be foolish to abandon this heritage carelessly.
	*My own sense is that for much of the century we were engaged in implicit or explicit debates over the rise of the state. What sort of state did free people want? What were they willing to pay for it and what purposes did they wish it to serve?		*My own sense is that for much of the century we were engaged in implicit or explicit debates over the rise of the state. What sort of state did free people want? What were they willing to pay for it and what purposes did they wish it to serve?

Marcin: /* Notes */

2025-01-12T11:41:04Z

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	=Notes=		=Notes=
			*They achieved something which, as late as the 1930s, seemed almost inconceivable: they forged strong, high-taxing and actively interventionist democratic and constitutional states which could encompass complex mass societies without resorting to violence or repression. We would be foolish to abandon this heritage carelessly.
	*My own sense is that for much of the century we were engaged in implicit or explicit debates over the rise of the state. What sort of state did free people want? What were they willing to pay for it and what purposes did they wish it to serve?		*My own sense is that for much of the century we were engaged in implicit or explicit debates over the rise of the state. What sort of state did free people want? What were they willing to pay for it and what purposes did they wish it to serve?
	*Remember that in Europe above all, those who have been most successful in mobilizing such fears—fears of strangers, of immigrants, of economic uncertainty or violence—are primarily the conventional, old-fashioned demagogic, nationalist, xenophobic politicians		*Remember that in Europe above all, those who have been most successful in mobilizing such fears—fears of strangers, of immigrants, of economic uncertainty or violence—are primarily the conventional, old-fashioned demagogic, nationalist, xenophobic politicians

Marcin: /* Notes */

2025-01-12T11:38:57Z

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			*My own sense is that for much of the century we were engaged in implicit or explicit debates over the rise of the state. What sort of state did free people want? What were they willing to pay for it and what purposes did they wish it to serve?
	*Remember that in Europe above all, those who have been most successful in mobilizing such fears—fears of strangers, of immigrants, of economic uncertainty or violence—are primarily the conventional, old-fashioned demagogic, nationalist, xenophobic politicians		*Remember that in Europe above all, those who have been most successful in mobilizing such fears—fears of strangers, of immigrants, of economic uncertainty or violence—are primarily the conventional, old-fashioned demagogic, nationalist, xenophobic politicians
	*teresting how in American English “social security” and “national security” are entirely different things. Whereas in political practice, I’m sure it’s the case that people who feel secure about various aspects of their lives are less threatened by external shocks. I think Americans are vulnerable to the politics of terror		*teresting how in American English “social security” and “national security” are entirely different things. Whereas in political practice, I’m sure it’s the case that people who feel secure about various aspects of their lives are less threatened by external shocks. I think Americans are vulnerable to the politics of terror

Marcin: /* Notes */

2025-01-12T11:37:02Z

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			*Remember that in Europe above all, those who have been most successful in mobilizing such fears—fears of strangers, of immigrants, of economic uncertainty or violence—are primarily the conventional, old-fashioned demagogic, nationalist, xenophobic politicians
	*teresting how in American English “social security” and “national security” are entirely different things. Whereas in political practice, I’m sure it’s the case that people who feel secure about various aspects of their lives are less threatened by external shocks. I think Americans are vulnerable to the politics of terror		*teresting how in American English “social security” and “national security” are entirely different things. Whereas in political practice, I’m sure it’s the case that people who feel secure about various aspects of their lives are less threatened by external shocks. I think Americans are vulnerable to the politics of terror
	*What Europeans have that Americans have long lacked is security: economic security, physical security, cultural security.		*What Europeans have that Americans have long lacked is security: economic security, physical security, cultural security.

Marcin: /* Notes */

2025-01-12T11:32:58Z

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			*teresting how in American English “social security” and “national security” are entirely different things. Whereas in political practice, I’m sure it’s the case that people who feel secure about various aspects of their lives are less threatened by external shocks. I think Americans are vulnerable to the politics of terror
	*What Europeans have that Americans have long lacked is security: economic security, physical security, cultural security.		*What Europeans have that Americans have long lacked is security: economic security, physical security, cultural security.
	*I think it would serve us all well to “kill all the economists” (to paraphrase Shakespeare): very few of them add to the sum of social or scientific knowledge, but a substantial majori		*I think it would serve us all well to “kill all the economists” (to paraphrase Shakespeare): very few of them add to the sum of social or scientific knowledge, but a substantial majori

Marcin: /* Notes */

2025-01-12T11:30:28Z

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			*What Europeans have that Americans have long lacked is security: economic security, physical security, cultural security.
	*I think it would serve us all well to “kill all the economists” (to paraphrase Shakespeare): very few of them add to the sum of social or scientific knowledge, but a substantial majori		*I think it would serve us all well to “kill all the economists” (to paraphrase Shakespeare): very few of them add to the sum of social or scientific knowledge, but a substantial majori
	*The reason should have been obvious to the market’s own advocates: in an open international economy, given free collective bargaining and freedom of movement, even the cheaper producers would eventually end up paying costs comparable to those of their more expensive western competitors.		*The reason should have been obvious to the market’s own advocates: in an open international economy, given free collective bargaining and freedom of movement, even the cheaper producers would eventually end up paying costs comparable to those of their more expensive western competitors.

Marcin: /* Notes */

2025-01-12T11:23:01Z

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			*I think it would serve us all well to “kill all the economists” (to paraphrase Shakespeare): very few of them add to the sum of social or scientific knowledge, but a substantial majori
	*The reason should have been obvious to the market’s own advocates: in an open international economy, given free collective bargaining and freedom of movement, even the cheaper producers would eventually end up paying costs comparable to those of their more expensive western competitors.		*The reason should have been obvious to the market’s own advocates: in an open international economy, given free collective bargaining and freedom of movement, even the cheaper producers would eventually end up paying costs comparable to those of their more expensive western competitors.
	*But since 1980 or so, the question has been posed differently: why should there be any public monopolies? Why should not everything be open to profit?		*But since 1980 or so, the question has been posed differently: why should there be any public monopolies? Why should not everything be open to profit?

Marcin: /* Notes */

2025-01-12T11:14:27Z

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			*The reason should have been obvious to the market’s own advocates: in an open international economy, given free collective bargaining and freedom of movement, even the cheaper producers would eventually end up paying costs comparable to those of their more expensive western competitors.
	*But since 1980 or so, the question has been posed differently: why should there be any public monopolies? Why should not everything be open to profit?		*But since 1980 or so, the question has been posed differently: why should there be any public monopolies? Why should not everything be open to profit?
	*contemporary cult of privatization: the sense that what is private, what is paid for, is somehow better for just that reason		*contemporary cult of privatization: the sense that what is private, what is paid for, is somehow better for just that reason

Marcin: /* Notes */

2024-12-25T03:07:04Z

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			*But since 1980 or so, the question has been posed differently: why should there be any public monopolies? Why should not everything be open to profit?
	*contemporary cult of privatization: the sense that what is private, what is paid for, is somehow better for just that reason		*contemporary cult of privatization: the sense that what is private, what is paid for, is somehow better for just that reason
	*We are accordingly advised that everything begins with economics. But this reduces intellectuals—no less than the workers they are discussing—to rodents on a treadmill		*We are accordingly advised that everything begins with economics. But this reduces intellectuals—no less than the workers they are discussing—to rodents on a treadmill

Marcin: /* Notes */

2024-12-25T02:57:35Z

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			*contemporary cult of privatization: the sense that what is private, what is paid for, is somehow better for just that reason
	*We are accordingly advised that everything begins with economics. But this reduces intellectuals—no less than the workers they are discussing—to rodents on a treadmill		*We are accordingly advised that everything begins with economics. But this reduces intellectuals—no less than the workers they are discussing—to rodents on a treadmill
	*And I wonder if something which is missing today isn’t the same willingness or ability of intellectuals to formulate what’s actually going on in the economy and in society.		*And I wonder if something which is missing today isn’t the same willingness or ability of intellectuals to formulate what’s actually going on in the economy and in society.