Still On That Road To Serfdom

The news has it that Friedrich Hayek's The Road To Serfdom, his only book written for the wider audience of general readers, is topping the Amazon bestseller list these days, some 40 years after it was first published. If you haven't read it, here is an illustrated version that captures the gist of his message very succinctly. Do go through it - it will take just a few minutes - and then read on.

The Road To Serfdom is a powerful book against government "planning." It tells you why planning must fail, and further, why these failures will lead to the call for a "strong man" who will inevitably lead the nation on the path of totalitarianism. The book was a huge success in its time, with Readers' Digest publishing a condensed version that made Hayek a household name in much of the world - except India, of course, where the "planners" control the universities, and much of the press. If India is to escape totalitarianism and progess on the path of Liberty, this book must be widely read throughout the land, especially in schools, colleges and universities. The illustrated version must be published here in book form and widely circulated.

Today, with Chacha Manmohan S Gandhi at the helm, central planning continues. The rhetoric is bad enough - what with the press extolling the wisdom of chhota ustad montek - but what is much worse is the FACT that in schools, colleges and universities, all students of Economics do a compulsory paper in "Indian Economics" (as thought a science has a nationality!) that centres around planning, planners and their pious intentions: every plan, from the first to the twelfth, is studied in detail. This is not Economics. This is propaganda - something that the Road to Serfdom warns us against. This is not education; it is indoctrination. It is vile.

Economics is about the pith of human existence - of buying and selling, something we all do many times each day in The Market. It is this that students should study - on their own, and challenge the intellectual authority of their government-sponsored teachers.

Let us not forget that a "strong man" is currently waiting in the wings - Narendra Modi. I was in a bookshop in Panjim the other day, where I found an impressive hardbound tome on this fascist titled Narendra Modi and the Making of a Modern State. More from the propaganda machine. If this guy and the ugly BJP take over because of Chacha's many abject failures, the nation is doomed.

Read The Road to Serfdom. Spread its message. And let's get on the road to Liberty. The totalitarians must be defeated. Serious students are also advised to read Hayek's Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism. The first two volumes of Law, Legislation & Liberty are also highly recommended, especially for students of Law.