Francis Fukuyama cements his reputation as a wide-ranging public intellectual with this big-think book on social order and human nature. Following his earlier successes (The End of History and the Last Man and Trust), Fukuyama argues that civilization is in the midst of a revolution on a par with hunter-gatherers learning how to farm or agricultural societies turning industrial. He finds much to celebrate in this cultural, economic, and technological transformation, but "with all the blessings that flow from a more complex, information-based economy, certain bad things also happened to our social and moral life." Individualism, for example, fuels innovation and prosperity, but has also "corroded virtually all forms of authority and weakened the bonds holding families, neighborhoods, and nations together." Yet this is not a pessimistic book: "Social order, once disrupted, tends to get remade again" because humans are built for life in a civil society governed by moral rules.

We're on the tail end of the "great disruption," says Fukuyama, and signs suggest a coming era of much-needed social reordering. He handles complex ideas from diverse fields with ease (this is certainly the first book whose acknowledgments thank both science fiction novelist Neal Stephenson and social critic James Q. Wilson), and he writes with laser-sharp clarity. Fans of Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel and David Landes's The Wealth and Poverty of Nations will appreciate The Great Disruption, as will just about any reader curious about what the new millennium may bring. This is simply one of the best nonfiction books of 1999. --John J. Miller


From Publishers Weekly
Fukuyama attempts to reconcile the extent of social disruption experienced in many Western countries during the past 30 years with his neo-Hegelian belief that the triumph of Western liberal democracy represents an end of history (articulated in The End of History and the Last Man). He successfully contends that the "Great Disruption" Western nations are experiencing as society moves from an industrial to an information economy is much like the social upheaval that accompanied the industrial revolution. After defining the Great Disruption (the usual litany of increased crime, family breakdown and lack of confidence in public institutions), Fukuyama turns to an exploration of the nature of human beings and morality. In doing so, he makes much of the idea of "social capital," which he defines as "a set of informal values or norms shared among members of a group that permits cooperation among them." Social capital is lacking in periods of disruption and is present when periods of disruption come to an end. Simply put, it's what makes civil society possible. He concludes that Western societies are now reconstructing their social ordersAmuch as they have over the course of historyAthrough revitalized morality, renewed civic pride and strengthened family life. As in previous books, Fukuyama's conclusions are less interesting than the way he arrives at them through a willingness to ask the big questions and an ability to look at contemporary society through the lens of his own vast reading and scholarship. Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.


The New York Times Book Review, Anthony Gottlieb
...his careful reporting of a wide range of social data and his critical account of the various explanations that have been offered for them make this a useful volume.


The Wall Street Journal, Alan Ehrenhalt
...even Mr. Fukuyama's harshest critics have to give him credit for something important. He asks large questions; he generates coherent answers; and he changes the agenda of public debate.


The Los Angeles Times Sunday Book Review, Virginia Postrel
The Great Disruption is an important and ambitious work. It promises to communicate unconventional ideas to political intellectuals bound by convention and thus to inject much needed vitality and realism into stale and stylized debates.


From Booklist
Fukuyama's two previous books staked a distinct claim on the intellectual landscape, and this one extends the arguments floated in Trust (1995). Put simply, he argues that the Western world has begun to turn away from 1960s social innovations for the reason that the transition from an industrial to an information economy is largely complete. Concomitant with that, "social capital" is accumulating again after decades of rights-endowed individualism. In detail Fukuyama's views are more academically nuanced; but fundamentally he discerns a cultural reversal of sociological indicators, proferring in support scads of data and graphs on crime, marriage and fertility, and public opinion about values. Some readers might find more forceful, however, his exposition on human nature and the origin of the family, especially if one rejects the claim that they are socially constructed. Fukuyama thinks they are not and that from them emerge the informal norms that create social order, so that stable families equal socialized kids equal low crime and trust-based capitalism. Brainy stuff for the debate minded. Gilbert Taylor


From Kirkus Reviews
Technological and economic progress meet social decay in this ambitious book that promises more than it delivers. Part of what makes reading Fukuyama (Public Policy/George Mason Univ.) fun and interesting is his willingness to take on big questions, as he did in The End of History and the Last Man (1992). Here he tackles what he finds to be the epochal transformation of developed societies into a postindustrial era where information and knowledge form the basis of economic life. He finds this transformation to be as monumental as the Industrial Revolution, and as disruptive. The dawn of the postindustrial era, roughly since the 1960s, has been accompanied by dramatic increases in crime, family breakups, and public distrust. Why has this occurred, what is the connection between technological change and social upheaval? Fukuyama maintains that technological changes have allowed certain things to occur that would not have otherwise. A post-industrial economy, which needs brains not brawn, has allowed unprecedented numbers of women to enter the workforce. While not necessarily bad in itself, this trend has contributed to the breakdown of families. When this happens, naturally aggressive young men do not have the checks on their actions that a strong family presents, hence the increase in crime. The advent of the pill and abortion have allowed men to be sexually more promiscuous and abdicate their communal responsibilities, such as control[ling] access to women on the part of younger men. Fukuyama deals with much more, yet what he says returns again and again to family. In the end he is optimistic that families, and hence society, will right themselves, for we are social animals and it is in our nature to reconstitute society into viable and functional forms. He may be correct, but the book ends up being a disingenuous defense of specific values rather than any dispassionate analysis of the interactions of technological and social change. A disappointing effort that, for all its detail, says very little. (First serial to Atlantic Monthly) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.


Review
Walter Kirn New York Magazine Fukuyama is no alarmist -- he's too cool for that, too academic and wedded to the sociological long view -- but now and then he spins a nightmare scenario....Fukuyama draws on a dozen disciplines, from game theory to genetics, to make his case that stable states arise naturally from chaotic interludes the way Sunday morning follows Saturday night.


Book Description
In the past thirty years, the United States has undergone a profound transformation in its social structure: Crime has increased, trust has declined, families have broken down, and individualism has triumphed over community. Has the Great Disruption of recent decades rent the fabric of American society irreparably? In this brilliant and sweeping work of social, economic, and moral analysis, Francis Fukuyama shows that even as the old order has broken apart, a new social order is already taking its place. The Great Disruption forges a new model for understanding the Great Reconstruction that is under way.


Card catalog description
The Great Disruption begins by observing that over the past thirty years, the United States and other developed countries have undergone a profound transformation from industrial to information societies; knowledge has replaced mass production as the basis of wealth, power, and social interaction. At the same time, Western societies have endured increasing levels of crime, massive changes in fertility and family structure, decreasing levels of trust, and the triumph of individualism over community. Just as the Industrial Revolution brought about momentous changes in society's moral values, a similar Great Disruption in our own time has caused profound changes in our social structure. Drawing on the latest sociological data and new theoretical models from fields as diverse as economics and biology, Fukuyama reveals that even though the old order has broken apart, a new social order is already taking shape. Indeed, he suggests, the Great Disruption of the 1960s and 1970s may be giving way to a Great Reconstruction, as Western society weaves a new fabric of social and moral values appropriate to the changed realities of the postindustrial world.


About the Author
Francis Fukuyama is a professor of public policy at George Mason University and the author of The End of History and the Last Man and Trust: The Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity. He lives in McLean, Virginia.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

The Great Disruption begins by observing that over the past thirty years, the United States and other developed countries have undergone a profound transformation from industrial to information societies; knowledge has replaced mass production as the basis of wealth, power, and social interaction. At the same time, Western societies have endured increasing levels of crime, massive changes in fertility and family structure, decreasing levels of trust, and the triumph of individualism over community. Just as the Industrial Revolution brought about momentous changes in society's moral values, a similar Great Disruption in our own time has caused profound changes in our social structure. Drawing on the latest sociological data and new theoretical models from fields as diverse as economics and biology, Fukuyama reveals that even though the old order has broken apart, a new social order is already taking shape. Indeed, he suggests, the Great Disruption of the 1960s and 1970s may be giving way to a Great Reconstruction, as Western society weaves a new fabric of social and moral values appropriate to the changed realities of the postindustrial world.

FROM THE CRITICS

David Shi - Christian Science Monitor

...Fukuyama marshals an impressive array of data...to bolster his broad thesis....[His] controversial assertions...are enough to create a stimulating book, but Fukuyama offers more....[A] must-read for those interested in the human condition.

Anthony Gottlieb

...Fukuyama is an analyst who does notintellectually speakingget out of bed for anything less than the all-encompassing grand sweep of history....[He] reaffirms his belief that history "appears to be progressive and directional" in the political and economic realm....He has given us strong reasons to believe that a recovery would comeand the evidence to show that it in fact did. You don't need an upward arrow of History to know which way the wind blows. —The New York Times Book Review

Publishers Weekly

Fukuyama attempts to reconcile the extent of social disruption experienced in many Western countries during the past 30 years with his neo-Hegelian belief that the triumph of Western liberal democracy represents an end of history (articulated in The End of History and the Last Man). He successfully contends that the "Great Disruption" Western nations are experiencing as society moves from an industrial to an information economy is much like the social upheaval that accompanied the industrial revolution. After defining the Great Disruption (the usual litany of increased crime, family breakdown and lack of confidence in public institutions), Fukuyama turns to an exploration of the nature of human beings and morality. In doing so, he makes much of the idea of "social capital," which he defines as "a set of informal values or norms shared among members of a group that permits cooperation among them." Social capital is lacking in periods of disruption and is present when periods of disruption come to an end. Simply put, it's what makes civil society possible. He concludes that Western societies are now reconstructing their social orders--much as they have over the course of history--through revitalized morality, renewed civic pride and strengthened family life. As in previous books, Fukuyama's conclusions are less interesting than the way he arrives at them through a willingness to ask the big questions and an ability to look at contemporary society through the lens of his own vast reading and scholarship. (June) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.

Charles Murray - Commentary

...[T]akes on questions that go to the heart of social policy writ large. It is written with never-failing lucidity, brings together vast and disparate literatures, and makes one think in new ways about the prospects of post-industrial society. That is quite enough for one book.

Phillip E. Johnson - National Review