Simply a brilliant and iconoclastic work of nonfiction. The author has a mind for ideas and their consequences and makes a case for the defense of the independent creator. ( )

"This diverse, decentralized process makes technocrats uncomfortable—no one is in charge, and the results are unpredictable—but it strikes reactionaries as downright evil. They find its ambition unseemly, its results disruptive, its values perverse. Open-ended trial and error represents a willful rebellion against fate, a refusal, in their minds, to honor what is and what has gone before. It views civilization as an ongoing process rather than an eternal state. It overvalues the future and encourages discontent."

The above quote from the book is at the heart of what The Future and Its Enemies is trying to persuade. If the passage speaks to you, then I recommend you read the whole thing. Virginia Postrel's work is a marvel, and if nothing else, she highlights a clash of philosophical worldviews that do not fall along the standard left/right, liberal/conservative continuum. To those seeking to control and contain, know that this is a fool's errand. The future is guaranteed to surprise us with upheavals of the most cataclysmic and wondrous kind. ( )

Today we have greater wealth, health, opportunity, and choice than at any time in history. Yet a chorus of intellectuals and politicians laments our current condition -- as slaves to technology, coarsened by popular culture, and insecure in the face of economic change. The future, they tell us, is dangerously out of control, and unless we precisely govern the forces of change, we risk disaster. In The Future and Its Enemies, Virginia Postrel explodes the myths behind these claims. Using examples that range from medicine to fashion, she explores how progress truly occurs and demonstrates that human betterment depends not on conformity to one central vision but on creativity and decentralized, open-ended trial and error. She argues that these two opposing world-views -- stasis vs. dynamism -- are replacing left and right to define our cultural and political debate as we enter the next century. In this bold exploration of how civilizations learn, Postrel heralds a fundamental shift in the way we view politics, culture, technology, and society as we face an unknown -- and invigorating -- future.

Somewhat unusually for a libertarian-type book (Postrel is former editor-in-chief of Reason magazine,) this volume is geared towards general readers who don't already identify as agreeing with the author. Essentially, the book argues that the groupings "right" and "left" aren't really how politics are organized - that it's about a person's opinion of change, choice, and openness, and that people on the "left" and the "right" may end up on either side of the question of dynamism (change is good) versus stasism (change is bad.)

I liked it, but I also like John Stossel and Ayn Rand and Radley Balko. Recommended for political science junkies, libertarians, and people who wonder why it is they hate Lou Dobbs and Bill O'Reilly AND Pat Robertson all at once.

Oh, and be sure to actually read the end notes. They're actually interesting. ( )

Insightful position on a rarely explored dimension, applicable to Libertarianism. Postrel is a "dynamist" (vs. "stasist") and she achieves a fascinating, compact explanation of the difference and meaning. The few years since this was published continue to prove her points. I'm still undecided regarding some of the bioethical issues, but am generally convinced of the merits of "dynamism." ( )