The great degeneration - Niall Ferguson

The decline of the West is something that has long been prophesied.
Symptoms of decline are all around us today: slowing growth, crushing
debts, ageing populations. But what exactly is amiss with Western
civilization? The answer, Niall Ferguson argues, is that the
institutions that were once the four pillars of Western society -
representative government, the free market, the rule of law and civil
society - are degenerating.


The Great Degeneration is
a powerful indictment of an era of negligence and complacency. To stop
us frittering away the institutional inheritance of centuries, Ferguson
warns, will take heroic leadership and radical reform.

'A refreshing perspective on the economic decline of advanced countries and the origins of the crisis'
Samuel Brittan, Financial Times

'He writes with splendid panache and a seemingly effortless, debonair wit'
The Times


'One of the most incisive writers of history, politics and economics today'
Sunday Telegraph


'Niall Ferguson has transformed the intellectual landscape'
Economist