Sebastian Wang, “Hoppe’s Lost Civilisation: A Review of A Short History of Man: Progress and Decline,” Libertarian Alliance Blog [UK] (21 August, 2025)
Hoppe’s Lost Civilisation: A Review of A Short History of Man: Progress and Decline
Hans-Hermann Hoppe
A Short History of Man: Progress and Decline
Ludwig von Mises Institute, Auburn, Alabama, 2015,
113 pages, ISBN: 978-1-61016-592-4; download here, or preferably buy hereHans-Hermann Hoppe is a divisive thinker, though not in the way one might expect. He does not shout, nor does he sermonise. He reasons. And in A Short History of Man: Progress and Decline, published by the Mises Institute, he offers a calm but devastating account of how civilisation was built—and how it is now being dismantled, largely with democratic consent. It is not a cheerful book. But then again, neither is history.
At 113 pages, this is no sprawling chronicle. It is a tightly argued triptych of essays: “On the Origin of Private Property and the Family,” “From the Malthusian Trap to the Industrial Revolution,” and “From Aristocracy to Monarchy to Democracy.” Each follows logically from the last, and each takes aim at a cherished myth of modernity. Progress, Hoppe reminds us, is real. But it is also reversible.
