The fall of the Berlin Wall was more than just a visible symbol of the death of Communism. It was a defeat for the entire world system of nation-states and a triumph of efficiency and markets. The fulcrum of power underlying history has shifted. We believe that the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 culminates the era of the nation-state, a peculiar

whether these developments can or should proceed in the face of opposition from legions of losers will be among the more important controversies of the Information Age.

Efficiency will become more important than the dictates of power in the organization of social institutions. This means that provinces and even cities that can effectively uphold property rights and provide for the administration of justice, while consuming few resources, will be viable sovereignties in the Information Age, as they generally have

The “Dark Ages” were so named for a reason. Literacy became so rare that anyone who possessed the ability to read and write could expect immunity from prosecution for almost any crime, including murder. Artistic, scientific, and engineering skills that had been highly developed in Roman times disappeared. From road building to the grafting of vines

people at all times and places tend to respond to incentives. Not always as mechanically as economists imagine, but they do respond. Costs and rewards matter. Changes in external conditions that raise the rewards or lower the costs of certain behavior will lead to more of that behavior, other things being-equal.

People are always and everywhere to some degree conservative, with a small “c.” That implies a reluctance to think in terms of dissolving venerable social conventions, overturning the accepted institutions, and defying the laws and values from which they drew their bearings. Few are inclined to imagine that apparently minor changes in climate or

The theme of this book is the new revolution of power which is liberating individuals at the expense of the twentieth-century nation-state.

Through all of human history from its earliest beginnings until now, there have been only three basic stages of economic life: (1) hunting-and-gathering societies; (2) agricultural societies; and (3) industrial societies. Now, looming over the horizon, is something entirely new, the fourth stage of social organization: information societies.

New technologies will allow the holders of wealth to bypass the national monopolies that have issued and regulated money in the modern period.