What Comes After the End of History? with Francis Fukuyama (Part One)

Mia Sorrenti (0:00)

Hello, Intelligence Squared members. Senior producer Mia Sorrenti here.

Was Francis Fukuyama wrong about the end of history? Or are we still living through the argument he began? Today's members episode is the full recording of our recent live event with political thinker and author Francis Fukuyama.

Fukuyama joined us at Union Chapel in London to discuss the crisis facing liberal democracy and the changing world order. More than three decades after the end of history made him one of the world's most debated political thinkers, Fukuyama reflects on a world increasingly shaped by war, populism, polarization, and authoritarianism. Drawing on his new political memoir, In the Realm of the Last Man, he examines what has happened to the liberal democratic order, and what Western democracies must do if they are to renew themselves. Let's join our host, Martin Wolff, now live at Union Chapel.

Martin Wolf (0:56)

So thank you very much for the introduction. Before we start just to lay out what's going to happen, we're going to have a discussion between us of Francis Fukuyama's new book, which will last about an hour. Then there will be 30 minutes for questions. I will try to take questions from here and also from the gallery. Though I have to say, I'm pretty blinded by the lights. I'll do my best.

And when I will set out the ground rules for those Q&A session, we will stop promptly at half past eight. And after that, as has been said, you will be able to get Frank, as we know him, to sign your copies, which will no doubt instantly quadruple the value, at the very least. Now, I'm delighted to this. I think he's one of the most interesting, I actually think the most interesting, public intellectual working broadly in the spheres of political philosophy, political science, development, democracy, political organization, and the state that there is in the world. And he has one virtue which I have come to regard, probably because I've shown some of the same behavior, as the most, the single most powerful indicator of the value of an intellectual, which is he changes his mind.

And if anyone he writes as long as he has or I've done and never changes his or her mind, you know this person never thinks. And so that's something I particularly admire. And we're going to talk about that in the discussion of this new book, In the Realm of the Last Man. And we're going to talk about why that title means so much. Because Francis certainly lived in the realm of the last man since he read that very famous book The End of History and the Last Man in 1992 That was after the essay. So and he's lived with that, and it's a fascinating review. I would just say, before we get into it, the book is essentially an account of the intellectual history and life, but very much of life in the public eye of this man. And therefore, it's an account not only of the way his ideas have developed, but also, of course, of what's happened to make his ideas change. Because in case you've not been noticing, since 1990, 92, the world has changed quite a bit. And that is reflected very well in the book. So I'd like to start with a sort of few overview questions, and then we'll get to some really central issues you discuss. But the start point is, why did you decide the time has come to write this account of your lifetime of thought? That sort of sounds like the last book.

You wanted to make a summation of where you'd got to and why.

Francis Fukuyama (4:29)

Yeah, I tell my family, this is it. No more books after this.

So there are a couple of reasons.

Martin Wolf (4:35)

That is the promise you made?

Francis Fukuyama (4:37)

Yeah, it is a promise I made. Okay.

Martin Wolf (4:39)

That's quite a bold promise.

Francis Fukuyama (4:40)

Yeah.

So there are a couple of reasons. So one is that there's been such a broad misunderstanding of the end of history, and I've made so many attempts to correct the record, and it doesn't seem to have any effect. And I figured maybe one last effort to do it in the form of a book might help.

You know, every week I get three or four snarky comments about, well, is this really the end of history, Mr. End of History? And I have an answer to that. I've been answering that for 35 years, but it doesn't seem to penetrate. I figured maybe if I did it one more time in a more comprehensive way, people would understand. The answer, by the way, is connected to the title of the memoir. The people that say, well, Mr. End of History, what about, you know, Ukraine? Or what about September 11th? Didn't actually read the last five chapters of the book, which are the chapters on The Last Man, where I talk about all the reasons that democracy actually not sustain itself over a long period of time. So I wanted to get that out. I also wanted to talk about something that I'd never really discussed systematically, which is a kind of cycle of thought that begins with September 11th, the collapse of the states in Afghanistan and Iraq, which then got me thinking about the importance of having a modern state to the problem of development, and then starting thinking about the American state and how it's actually underdeveloped. And not only is it underdeveloped, but under the attack of the opponents of the deep state around Donald Trump, it's actually going backwards. And that strikes me as a big problem for the world as a whole, because America needs a state and I think the world needs America.