alt Hacker News> I don't think you can have a "free and global market" when countries participate in large-scale state industrial policy.
All industrialized countries participate in large-scale state industrial policy. It's a pre-condition of industrialization. A nation cannot industrialize without large scale state policy. And once industrialized, all nations maintain large-scale state industrial policy. Are you saying there never has or can be a "free and global" market? Or just when china does it?
> You may think of it analogously to Free Speech.
It's nothing like free speech as free speech is a constitutional right granted within a nation.
> The reality is that if you allow convincing enough liars, your society starts to falter.
That's rich coming from someone peddling zeihan. I've always wondered what kind of morons actually believe his nonsense. Now I know.
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The US industrialized without much in the way of large scale state industrial policy. The federal government was quite weak in the 19th century and, excepting tariffs on British goods, I can't think of any explicit policies it established that were intended to foster industrial capacity. And I think it's debatable how much tariffs actually helped the US develop its manufacturing capacity
Zeihan is wonderful if read as a post-modern, historical fiction novelist.
The characters and plots are obviously all exaggerations and fabrications of reality but there are many interesting themes in his novels.
Of course, reading him like he is Edward Gibbon would be pretty foolish but The End of the World is just the Beginning is a great book.