To help me better understand what exactly is “the Whig interpretation of history” would that be exemplified in the writings of Steven pinker more than AJR?
Adam: something about Fukuyama which you likely know but which I didn't realize until recently is that he saw his enormous Political Order project not primarily as an attack on neoconservative ideas about exporting democracy. In FF's mind his main targets were North, Acemoglu and their co-authors. He wanted to offer a less economistic version of the same general narrative, one in line with his end-of-history anthropology.
To help me better understand what exactly is “the Whig interpretation of history” would that be exemplified in the writings of Steven pinker more than AJR?
Adam: something about Fukuyama which you likely know but which I didn't realize until recently is that he saw his enormous Political Order project not primarily as an attack on neoconservative ideas about exporting democracy. In FF's mind his main targets were North, Acemoglu and their co-authors. He wanted to offer a less economistic version of the same general narrative, one in line with his end-of-history anthropology.
(See https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9780691217932-007/html and https://blogs.the-american-interest.com/2012/03/26/acemoglu-and-robinson-on-why-nations-fail/. There's also something to this effect in his book of interviews: https://press.georgetown.edu/Book/After-the-End-of-History).