Edward Luce's book is a magnificent account of the retreat of the Western liberal order. Lucidly written, blending a brilliant narrative style and Oxonian erudition, the British journalist and chief commentator on the United States of America of the Financial Times has continued with the concerns raised in his last book, Time to Start Thinking: America and the Spectre of Decline (2012), published in the aftermath of the 2008 economic recession. In this book, the author makes a profound diagnosis of not just the relative economic decline of the US but also the gradual waning of Western hegemony and the weakening of liberal democracy. As a proud liberal democrat, Luce argues that the election of Donald Trump, the Brexit vote in the United Kingdom and the boost to the 'alt-right' fringe of neo-Nazis and white supremacists in several European countries are not the real reasons of the crisis of Western liberalism. Rather, those phenomena are symptoms of the deepening problems within Western liberal democratic regimes, namely the uncouth inequality of the wealthiest one per cent of the West's population in relation to the remaining 99 per cent, along with the Western elite's arrogance towards the losers of globalization, the ignorance about how the West became hegemonic and the complacent attitude of the Western political leadership about the durability of liberal democracy. Luce convincingly argues how such attitudes have been emerging since the euphoria after the fall of the Soviet Union and East European socialism.

Besides the Preface, the book comprises four chapters or 'parts'. The first part, "Fusion", narrates the integration of the global economy and its tremendous impact on the lives of the Western middle-classes. The second part, "Reaction", explains the degeneration of liberal democratic politics in the West as a result of such an integrated world economy where losers of globalization find scapegoats in the figure of the immigrant. The third part, "Fallout", explores the implications of the declining hegemony of the "West" led by the US and the potential rise of China as a major superpower in the next few decades. The final chapter, "Half Life", proposes what needs to be done and cautions against the hazy demarcation between illiberal democracy and autocracy. Here the author defends the value of individual liberty, calls for an introspection of liberal elites and their temptation to indulge in comfortable lives while relegating themselves to the virtual space of occasional Facebook protest. The author's claims are often backed by evidence from empirical research, serious academic scholarship and important policy documents.

I have only one complaint against the author, particularly in relation to what is to be done. While Luce has correctly pointed out the reasons of the vulnerability and fragility of Western liberalism and has drawn interesting parallels between the globalized world order before World War I and that of the post-1990s, compared the context of the great economic recession of the 1930s that created conditions for the rise of European fascism with the post-2008 scenario, he could have argued in favour of taking appropriate lessons from John Maynard Keynes, whose economic thought saved liberal capitalism from its ruins. One cannot expect Marxist prescriptions from a liberal like Luce, but one could hope for a Keynesian approach to get out of the mess of economic crisis and its attendant problems in politics. The author has briefly discussed the early works of Keynes, where the great English economist saw the geopolitical implications of his own time. But Luce stops short of clearly saying that many economic problems of the majority of the Western population could be resolved by the pragmatic implementation of Keynesian policies, which could include massive governmental expenditure in health and education, unemployment allowances, pension benefits and various social welfare programmes, instead of following the neoliberal orthodoxy of austerity measures. The author has correctly argued that the increasing pace of automation is simultaneously resulting in the lack of employability. It is in this context of robots, artificial intelligence and superior machines replacing human labour in future that Keynes becomes more relevant than ever. The distorted political management of victims of capitalist growth and technological progress through the politics of racism and anti-immigration that often distracts the electorate from demanding income and employment could be replaced by constructive and progressive articulation along Keynesian lines.

The author tells the reader directly in the Preface that it would take "roughly three hours" to finish the four chapters of the book. But only a fast reader can do that. This reviewer took more time to read the book because each chapter has several insightful analyses that provoke one to think deeply about the rapid and sweeping changes at the levels of technology, geopolitics, and economy, along with the consequences of such dynamic alterations on the people at large.