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About the Book |
CRISIS AND LEVIATHAN: Critical Episodes in the Growth of American Government
by Robert Higgs
Foreword by Arthur A. Ekirch, Jr.
Everyone knows that government has continually grown in size and scope during this past century, but how and why has it done so? Is this growth inherent in the nature of government or because of some greater social needs, or are there other causes? In Crisis and Leviathan, Robert Higgs shows that the main reason lies in government’s responses to national “crises” (real or imagined), including economic upheavals (e.g., the Great Depression) and especially war (e.g., World Wars I and II, Cold War, etc.). The result is ever increasing government power which endures long after each crisis has passed, impinging on both civil and economic liberties and fostering extensive corporate welfare and pork. As government power grows, writes Higgs, it achieves a form of autonomy, making it ever more difficult to decrease its size and scope, and to resist its further efforts to increase its reach, so long as the citizenry remain uninformed of its true effects. One of the most important books ever written on the nature of government power, Crisis and Leviathan is a potent book whose message becomes more trenchant with every passing day.
• Comments
• Contents
• Foreword by Arthur A. Ekirch, Jr.
• Introduction
• About the Author, Robert Higgs
• Ordering Information