The Jolly Contrarian

The Jolly Contrarian

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The Jolly Contrarian
Seeing like a State
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Seeing like a State

JC revisits James C. Scott’s classic takedown of high-modernism. A parable for our times.

Jul 12, 2024
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The Jolly Contrarian
The Jolly Contrarian
Seeing like a State
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File:North Korea.jpg
A weekly stakeholder work-stream check-in call, yesterday.

No battle — Tarutino, Borodino, or Austerlitz — takes place as those who planned it anticipated. That is an essential condition.

—Tolstoy, War and Peace

Business, and government, suffers from a kind of physics envy.

—Rory Sutherland, citing Paul Ormerod

In sum, the legibility of a society provides th…

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