F. A. Hayek's Road To Serfdom—A Summary

In his book, The Road to Serfdom, Friedrich A. Hayek, touts classical liberalism and free market economics as the best way to build a happy wealthy nation. He recounts the history leading up to Nazi Germany through the rise of socialism. He demonstrates that democratic planning requires propaganda and coercion and is best implemented in an ignorant society. Hayek sought to find the true commonalities in the many sides of socialism. Fascism and communism are similar in that the end of either become totalitarian systems, but they differ when they exist in a capitalist system—one being a conservative party and the other a modern liberal party. Either way they both share the path of constant expansion of a centralized government. Hayek warns us in his book that unless we change our present course of collectivism we will be headed down the road to serfdom.