“I wish to add here that economic intervention, even the piecemeal methods advocated here, will tend to increase the power of the state. Interventionism is therefore extremely dangerous. This is not a decisive argument against it; state power must always remain a dangerous though necessary evil. But it should be a warning that if we relax our watchfulness, and if we do not strengthen our democratic institutions while giving more power to the state by interventionist planning, then we may lose our freedom. And if freedom is lost, everything is lost, including planning. For why should plans for the welfare of the people be carried out if the people have no power to enforce them? Only freedom can make security secure. We thus see that there is not only a paradox of freedom but also a paradox of state planning. If we plan too much, if we give too much power to the state, then freedom will be lost, and that will be the end of planning. Such considerations lead us back to our plea for piecemeal, and against Utopian or holistic, methods of social engineering. And they lead us back to our demand that measures should be planned to fight concrete evils rather than to establish some ideal good. State intervention should be limited to what is really necessary for the protection of freedom.” Karl Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies. (Chapter 17)
Posted on: Sat, 19 Apr 2014 03:30:01 +0000
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