The new book The Road to Socialism and Back, by George Mason University economist and philosopher Peter J. Boettke, his graduate student Konstantin Zhukov, and Fraser Institute senior fellow Matthew Mitchell, deals with the four- decade period after World War II when Poland experimented with socialism and the subsequent four decades when it has somewhat moved toward liberalism. The title reminds readers of Friedrich Hayek's The Road to Serfdom, and the book frequently cites him on economic and political freedom. More appropriately, it underscores how, like serfdom, socialism reduces people to mere factors of production. Gap between promises and realizations / One of the book's main conclusions is that there is a deep gap between the lofty stated goals of socialist ideology and the realized results in socialist Poland. Economic growth was less than promised, and socialism did not bring about the promised greater economic equality among Polish citizens. In its attempt to eliminate capitalism, the socialist experiment created a set of privileged insiders who were able to use their power to enrich themselves and their elite associates. Socialism lowered average income and increased inequality while it favored a set of privileged insiders called nomenklatura.
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