Narrow corridor

(8 May 2022)

Why nationals fail? How liberty works? Some months ago I read The narrow corridor (by Professors Acemoglu and Robinson) and was very inspired by their thoughts regarding these wide topics. Based on numerous examples from the world history, they provide a theoretical framework on how liberty and prosperity can prevail in societies. They suggest that they are generated by a (messy but) delicate and balanced interplay/struggle between the state and the civil society, where the state is powerful enough to do key decisions/actions while the civil society has controls on the state. Both of these forces need to be strong, and this balance of powers creates a situation where the two forces compete and drive the development of the society forward. It is the active participation that drives the development, rather than paper institutions. While too much state power without the participation/control of the civil society easily leads to despotisms (and loss of liberty and creativity), also societies without a state lack liberty since they are easily anarchic (e.g. too weak to protect individuals) or dominated by restrictive and static social norms. Balanced liberal societies, rather than oppressive norms and despotism, can efficiently generate prosperity as they for example allow liberty regarding economic activities challenging the status quo. Historicially, the progress towards a balanced situation may have first started in Europe when the culture of strong Roman state capacity met the assembly culture of (kind of democratic) Germanic tribes, after the collapse of the Roman empire. The book gave so many insights on societies, history, creative cultures and liberty that it is among my new favorites.