Roll over image to zoom in
Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed (Veritas Paperbacks)
£12.10£14.20 (-15%)
“One of the most profound and illuminating studies of this century to have been published in recent decades.”―John Gray, New York Times Book Review
“A powerful, and in many insightful, explanation as to why grandiose programs of social reform, not to mention revolution, so often end in tragedy. . . . An important critique of visionary state planning.”―Robert Heilbroner, Lingua Franca
“A powerful, and in many insightful, explanation as to why grandiose programs of social reform, not to mention revolution, so often end in tragedy. . . . An important critique of visionary state planning.”―Robert Heilbroner, Lingua Franca
Hailed as “a magisterial critique of top-down social planning” by the New York Times, this essential work analyzes disasters from Russia to Tanzania to uncover why states so often fail―sometimes catastrophically―in grand efforts to engineer their society or their environment, and uncovers the conditions common to all such planning disasters.
“Beautifully written, this book calls into sharp relief the nature of the world we now inhabit.”―New Yorker
“A tour de force.”― Charles Tilly, Columbia University
The Institution for Social and Policy Studies
Read more
Additional information
| Publisher | Yale University Press (12 May 2020) |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Paperback | 464 pages |
| ISBN-10 | 0300246757 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-0300246759 |
| Dimensions | 12.7 x 3.3 x 19.56 cm |
by RJM
I bought this because Tim Harford recommended it. It is interesting, makes a good point, but it is much, much too long. I know books have to be a certain size, but this one would be a gem if it was just edited ruthlessly.
by stuart d pringle
Very interesting book with a very good first chapter on France and the state of play with statecraft before and after revolution. German designed forestry ….French weights and scales and the design of equality accross states and the slow process of state control and rules. Measurements and statistics and fiscal calculations becoming the normal way of life. Much description on the state and its slow control and implementation of rules and policies.
A good book to start to understand why we are where we are now with how the states and governments run things With sometimes disasterous results.
Recommended book for my history degree by a great Ruskin college oxford teacher.
Useful for my first year dissertation to understand why things are like they are. And to understand why govt do what they do.
Recommended.
by Chris Ford
This is somewhat a meandering book, which suits me just fine. My personal interest is that as a software developer I want to understand the effect of codifying informal processes into formal systems. This book has been enormously influential to my thinking about standardisation, variation, surveillance and service, and practically speaking it finds its way into my consulting work surprisingly often.
by Arthur Doohan
A must read for those that need to understand the delusional nature of ‘management/hierarchy/bureaucracy’……
by wzuk
Excellent book with interesting hints for all who still uncritically accept state and governmental authorities…
by David Hugh-Jones
Lots of good examples. I’m not sure the thesis is wholly new – there are shades of Foucault in there.
by Client d’Amazon
Very good!
by Maia
Excellent, enlightening, dives into the social detail of multiple systems in a thoroughly engaging way in order to make his over riding point which is that we’re never doing quite what we think we are when we try to ‘manage’ complex human systems.