Hayek Flashcards
(23 cards)
Does history obey laws? (RTS)
” It is probably fortunate that man can never have this experi
ence and knows of no laws which history must obey.”
Whose fate are we at risk of repeating? (RTS)
” It is necessary now to state the unpalatable truth that it is Germany whose
fate we are in some danger of repeating. The danger is not immediate, it is true,
and conditions in England and the United States are still so remote from those
witnessed in recent years in Germany as to make it difficult to believe that we
are moving in the same direction. Yet, though the road be long, it is one on
which it becomes more difficult to turn back as one advances. “
What are people in Britain and America determined to do? (RTS)
” There exists now in these
countries certainly the same determination that the organization of the nation
which has been achieved for purposes of defense shall be retained for the pur
poses of creation. There is the same contempt for nineteenth-century liberal
ism, the same spurious “realism” and even cynicism, the same fatalistic ac
ceptance of “inevitable trends.” “
Who is responsible for the current situation and the one that prevailed in germany? (RTS)
” it was largely people of good will, men who were
admired and held up as models in the democratic countries, who prepared the
way for, if they did not actually create, the forces which now stand for every
thing they detest.”
What was fascism an outcome of? (RTS)
“Few are ready to recognize that the rise of fascism
and naziism was not a reaction against the socialist trends of the preceding
period but a necessary outcome of those tendencies.”
What are those who hate fascism doing? (RTS)
“As a result, many who think themselves
infinitely superior to the aberrations of naziism, and sincerely hate all its
manifestations, work at the same time for ideals whose realization would lead
straight to the abhorred tyranny”
If things go wrong what do people not accept? RTS
“we all are, or at
last were until recently, certain of one thing: that the leading ideas which dur
ing the last generation have become common to most people of good will and
have determined the major changes in our social life cannot have been wrong.”
Which basic ideas have we moved away from? RTS
” For at least twenty-five years before
the specter of totalitarianism became a real threat, we had progressively been
moving away from the basic ideas on which Western civilization has been built.
That this movement on which we have entered with such high hopes and am
bitions should have brought us face to face with the totalitarian horror has
come as a profound shock to this generation, which still refuses to connect the
two facts.”
What have we progresively abendoned? RTS
” We have progressively abandoned
that freedom in economic affairs without which personal and political freedom
has never existed in the past. Although we had been warned by some of the
greatest political thinkers of the nineteenth century, by Tocqueville and Lord
Acton, that socialism means slavery, we have steadily moved in the direction of
socialism.”
Other than freedom in economic affairs, what else has been abandoned? RTS
” Not merely nineteenth- and eighteenth-century liberalism, but the
basic individualism inherited by us from Erasmus and Montaigne, from Cicero
and Tacitus, Pericles and Thucydides, is progressively relinquished”
What sort of individualism does Hayek advocate? RTS
” But the essential
features of that individualism which, from elements provided by Christianity
and the philosophy of classical antiquity, was first fully developed during the
Renaissance and has since grown and spread into what we know asWestern
civilization—are the respect for the individual man quaman, that is, the recog
nition of his own views and tastes as supreme in his own sphere, however nar
rowly that may be circumscribed, and the belief that it is desirable that men
should develop their own individual gifts and bents.”
What does commerce do? RTS
” The gradual transformation of a rigidly organized hierarchic system into one
where men could at least attempt to shape their own life, where man gained the
opportunity of knowing and choosing between different forms of life, is closely
associated with the growth of commerce.”
What did commerce lead to? RTS
” The result of this growth surpassed all expectations. Wherever the barriers
to the free exercise of human ingenuity were removed, man became rapidly
able to satisfy ever widening ranges of desire. And while the rising standard
soon led to the discovery of very dark spots in society, spots which men were no
longer willing to tolerate, there was probably no class that did not substantially
benefit from the general advance.”
What is the basic principle of liberalism? RTS
” The fundamen
tal principle that in the ordering of our affairs we should make as much use as
possible of the spontaneous forces of society, and resort as little as possible to co
ercion, is capable of an infinite variety of applications.”
What is the liberal attitude towards society? RTS
” The attitude of the liberal toward society is like that of the gar
dener who tends a plant and, in order to create the conditions most favorable
to its growth, must know as much as possible about its structure and the way it
functions.”
What could be said to have caused liberalism’s decline? RTS
” It might even be said that the very success of liberalism
became the cause of its decline. Because of the success already achieved, man
became increasingly unwilling to tolerate the evils still with him which now ap
peared both unbearable and unnecessary”
How did liberalism come to be seen, and with what result? RTS
” What had been achieved came to be regarded as a secure and imperishable
possession, acquired once and for all. The eyes of the people became fixed on
the new demands, the rapid satisfaction of which seemed to be barred by the
adherence to the old principles. It became more and more widely accepted that
further advance could be expected not along the old lines within the general
framework which had made past progress possible but only by a complete re
modeling of society. It was no longer a question of adding to or improving the
existing machinery but of completely scrapping and replacing it.”
What is the goal now sought after? RTS
” According to the views now dominant, the question is no longer how we can
make the best use of the spontaneous forces found in a free society. We have in
effect undertaken to dispense with the forces which produced unforeseen re
sults and to replace the impersonal and anonymous mechanism of the market
by collective and “conscious” direction of all social forces to deliberately cho
sen goals.”
How did socialists regard freedom? RTS
” Where freedom was concerned, the founders of so
cialism made no bones about their intentions. Freedom of thought they re
garded as the root-evil of nineteenth-century society, and the first of modern
planners, Saint-Simon, even predicted that those who did not obey his pro
posed planning boards would be “treated as cattle.””
What did freedom used to mean? RTS
“To the great
apostles of political freedom the word had meant freedom from coercion, free
dom from the arbitrary power of other men, release from the ties which left the
individual no choice but obedience to the orders of a superior to whom he was
attached.”
What was the new freedom that socialism promised? RTS
“The new freedom promised, however, was to be freedom from ne
cessity, release from the compulsion of the circumstances which inevitably limit
the range of choice of all of us, although for some very much more than for oth
ers. Before man could be truly free, the “despotism of physical want” had to be
broken, the “restraints of the economic system” relaxed.”
What is the relation between communism and fascism? RTS
” Not that com
munism and fascism are essentially the same. Fascism is the stage reached af
ter communism has proved an illusion, and it has proved as much an illusion in
Stalinist Russia as in pre-Hitler Germany.””
