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Cover of The Logic of Rule: 5,000 Years of Political Competition
The Logic of Rule: 5,000 Years of Political Competition
Evolution as a Method of Political Analysis
Completed · 64 episodes
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Audio in Chinese
Liu Yu: Return to the Specific Historical Context—How Did Human Politics Arrive at That Point? 1. Evolution as a Method of Political Analysis 2. The Economic-Man Assumption: From Individual Choice to the Structural Problems of Collective Life 3. Why Did States Arise? Conflict Theory and the Paradox Thesis 4. Why Did States First Arise in Great River Valleys? A Social Model of the Early State 5. From the Political Landscape of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States Periods to the Diverging Fates of the Feudal Lords 6. What Did Shang Yang's Reforms Get Right? The Logic of Qin State-Building 7. The Rise of the Early Modern European State: A Model Driven by Rulers' Competition 8. Winners and Losers in European State-Building 9. From Strong Rulers to State-Building: Thinkers Across Time and Civilizations 10. The Enduring Dominant Power in the Premodern International System: Empire 11. How Do Empires Rise? An Organizational Theory of the State Why Should We Still Care About Politics in Peacetime? | Q&A, Part I 12. How Did War Become a Mode of Production? The Rise of the Mongol Empire Is Millennia of Human Politics a Cycle or Progress? | Q&A, Part II 13. Why Must All Roads Lead to Rome? The Secrets of Military Conquest and Political Control 14. Why Does Imperial Rule Decline? An Evolutionary Framework 15. The Model of Monarchical Rule and the Ideal Ruler 16. How Can Ideals and Reality Be Balanced? Models of the Ideal Ruler in Eastern and Western History 17. Why Can't the Most Politically Gifted Become Rulers? Interpreting Game of Thrones 18. Is There a Pattern to Good and Bad Emperors? Lessons from Rome and Ancient China 19. Why Are Ideal Rulers So Rare? Rulers' Objectives and the Structure of Power 20. The World's Most Dangerous Job? The Ruler's Own Struggle for Survival 21. Who Will Rule Next? The Succession Problem of Monarchy 22. How Can a Military Rebellion Be Prevented? The Ruler's Dilemma of Controlling Force 23. Emperors and the Machinery of Force: Ancient China, Rome, and Byzantium 24. Why Does Corruption Persist Despite Every Ban? The Dilemma of Controlling Bureaucracy 25. In Prosperity the People Suffer; in Ruin the People Suffer: Population Swings and Cycles of Violence under Monarchy Bao Gangsheng × Liu Qing: How Should We Understand Politics Today and Face an Increasingly Uncertain World? | Live Salon Transcript 26. Order, Disorder, Rise, and Fall under Monarchy: From the Roman to the Byzantine Empire 27. Are Ordinary People Destined to Be Powerless? Monarchical Rule and Public Welfare 28. How Does Arbitrary Power Corrupt Social Morals? The Moral Paradox of Monarchy 29. Why Does Long-Term Economic Stagnation Occur? Monarchy and the Malthusian Trap 30. How Did Democracy Become Possible? The Greek Polis and the Rise of Classical Democracy 31. Why Was a Brilliant Classical Political Civilization So Short-Lived? The Rise and Fall of Greek Democracy 32. The Roman Republic: A Mixture of Monarchy, Aristocracy, and Democracy 33. Why Did Classical Democracy and Republicanism Die Young While Monarchy Endured? 34. A New Model of Rule? Europe's Crisis and the Rise of Feudalism 35. Did Feudalism Lay the Groundwork for Constitutional Monarchy? The Distribution of Force and Contractual Relations 36. How Did Kings and Nobles Bargain? The Basic Features of Feudalism 37. Was Medieval Europe Really Dark? Loyalty, the Spirit of Contract, and Law 38. How Did Magna Carta Become Possible? The Key to the Rise of Constitutional Government 39. How Was Britain's Constitutional System Established? The King under Law and Parliamentary Sovereignty 40. What Kind of Government Does Society Need? Conceptual Innovation and Institutional Development in Britain 41. Why Did Early Modern European Politics Diverge? The Formation of Continental Absolutism 42. Why Didn't Washington Establish a Dictatorship? The Historical Foundations of American Checks and Balances 43. Is Government Simply There to Do Good for Everyone? The U.S. Constitution and Constraints on the State 44. How Do the President and Supreme Court Contend? Judicial Review in the United States 45. Why Did the Protagonists of History Shift from Kings and Generals to Business Elites? Property Rights and the Industrial Revolution 46. What Force Ultimately Ended Traditional Empires? The Industrial Revolution and the Transformation from Ancient to Modern Politics 47. The Competition of Civilizational Paradigms: Different Systems of Power, Resources, and Performance 48. How Did Ordinary People Win the Vote? The Conservative–Progressive Contest over Universal Suffrage 49. Repress or Compromise with an Awakened Public? The Political Logic behind the Rise of Modern Democracy 50. Is Democracy a “Good Thing”? The Tocqueville Turning Point in the Debate 51. Why Protect Minority Rights? Democracy's Constraints on the Modern State 52. How Did Big Government Arise? Democracy and the Transformation of Modern Government 53. Where Does Democracy Stand in Political Evolution? Its Historical Coordinates 54. Where Do We Go When Challenges Arrive? The Future of Modern Democracy and Four Great Revolutions 55. Why Did Japan Turn to Foreign Aggression? Late-Developing States in the World Order 56. Why Is War So Frequent in Syria and Elsewhere? State-Building in Late-Developing Countries 57. Why Are Democracy and the Rule of Law So Difficult? Political Evolution in Late-Developing Countries 58. Has Human Violence Declined? Spillover Effects and Differences in Political Evolution 59. How Does a Clash of Civilizations Produce Political Tragedy? Global Divisions across States, Regimes, and Civilizations 60. Will Nation-States Always Exist? Beyond Them—or toward Perpetual Peace