内容简介

The years since World War II have seen rapid shifts in the relative positions of different countries and regions. Leading political economist Mancur Olson offers a new and compelling theory to explain these shifts in fortune and then tests his theory against evidence from many periods of history and many parts of the world.

“[T]his elegant, readable book. . . sets out to explain why economies succumb to the ‘British disease,’ the kind of stagnation and demoralization that is now sweeping Europe and North America. . . . A convincing book that could make a big difference in the way we think about modern economic problems.”—Peter Passell, The New York Times Book Review

“Schumpeter and Keynes would have hailed the insights Olson gives into the sicknesses of the modern mixed economy.”—Paul A. Samuelson, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

“One of the really important books in social science of the past half-century.”—Scott Gordon, The Canadian Journal of Economics

“The thesis of this brilliant book is that the longer a society enjoys political stability, the more likely it is to develop powerful special-interest lobbies that in turn make it less efficient economically.”—Charles Peters, The Washington Monthly

“Remarkable. The fundamental ideas are simple, yet they provide insight into a wide array of social and historical issues. . . . The Rise and Decline of Nations promises to be a subject of productive interdisciplinary argument for years to come.”—Robert O. Keohane, Journal of Economic Literature

“I urgently recommend it to all economists and to a great many non-economists.”—Gordon Tullock, Public Choice

“Olson’s theory is illuminating and there is no doubt that The Rise and Decline of Nations will exert much influence on ideas and politics for many decades to come.”—Pierre Lemieux, Reason

Co-winner of the 1983 American Political Science Association’s Gladys M. Kammerer Award for the best book on U.S. national policy


Mancur Lloyd Olson, Jr. (pronounced /ˈmæŋsɜr/; January 22, 1932–February 19, 1998) was a leading American economist and social scientist who, at the time of his death, worked at the University of Maryland, College Park. Among other areas, he made contributions to institutional economics on the role of private property, taxation, public goods, collective action and contract righ...

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豆瓣评论

  • Diary
    少见的,及其优雅缜密的语言,仿佛每个句式都可以移花接木到人类的论文里。2021-09-03
  • 嘿哈嘿哈
    本书尝试论证一点:随着西方社会进入和平稳定发展的阶段,拥有共同利益倾向的个体、团体会逐渐聚集,并形成社会影响力。这些广泛分布的特殊利益集体(例如工会)会降低社会的生产效率,而目前西方的两党制政治体制不足以解决这些社会利益团体所带来的问题。事实上,作者仅说对了一半。详见书评。2012-10-21
  • 王亚军
    3星。特殊利益集团由于其规模小的缘故,更容易克服集体行动,而又由于它们在经济中占比如此的小,所以他们更乐于分蛋糕而不是把蛋糕做大,他们的这种倾向让它们不愿意接受新的技术,也让经济调整更加缓慢。在平静岁月里这种特殊利益集团开始聚集,而这也是为什么经济稳定期内,经济开始变差。虽然奥尔森的逻辑还算清楚,但是很多问题没有解释明白:比如为什么稳定的事情更容易形成利益集团?亨廷顿就提出变化社会更容易产出利益集团。我也不是很认同为什么利益集团的决策会比个人更慢:集团组织领导的作用以及信息收集的能力被忽视了。2021-01-20

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