The New Leviathans: Thoughts After Liberalism, John Gray, London: Allen Lane, 2023

John Gray’s (2023) The New Leviathans: Thoughts After Liberalism [henceforth “Leviathans”] provides a nuanced perspective on contemporary society with direct implications on the state of education in the West. Gray, characteristically pessimistic, draws on Thomas Hobbes’ depiction of Leviathan to analyze the resurgence of contemporary authoritarian states. Hobbes (1996) used Leviathan, the name taken from the sea monster in the Book of Job, to describe his concept of a sovereign government system that provides stability and security in exchange for citizens’ surrender of individual freedoms. Gray (2023) dismisses the liberal belief that history inevitably leads toward progression of democratic freedom and instead views liberalism as a failed political experiment, asserting: “The seeming triumph of liberalism and the free market was not an evolutionary trend but a political experiment, which has run its course” (p. 21). Gray characterizes liberalism through four defining features: (1) individualist— the moral primacy of the individual usurps the collective social thought; (2) egalitarian— all people in a society are equal; (3) universalist— moral unity among citizens; and (4) meliorist— the social system can constantly improve given human effort. In what follows, I will summarize the three major parts of Gray's book and examine its educational implications while considering how philosophy of education can help us weigh the merit of his argument. According to Hobbes (1996), language separates humans from other creatures in their ability to name and construct civil society. A consequence of language is the absurdity and confusion that can follow conflating descriptions and interpretations. While Hobbes believed this could be overcome by clear definitions, Gray (2023) disagrees and claims the consequence of language is the belief that words are more real than things. Therefore, words like “humanity” would take on an abstract meaning that “we” must defend against the cultural “other.” This concept opens the door for some humans being identified as less human than others, making violence against the “other” more ideologically reasonable. Gray (2023) analyzes two contemporary states that he considers new Leviathans: Russia and China. In Russia, religion (Russian Orthodoxy) has been appropriated by political ideology as an instrument of the state to achieve its aims. Intertwining religion and political strength legitimizes both domestic authority and foreign expansion when conquering other countries like Ukraine. In China, sovereignty justifies surveillance, discrimination against minorities, and social control as a means of maintaining national unity. Chinese leaders have argued that “the Chinese state must inject a definite set of values into the population. Otherwise, the country will undergo the decomposition that is underway in the US” (p. 46). The country’s surveillance system monitors citizen’s daily activities and deviation from prescribed conduct is punished. In both cases, Russia and China exemplify Gray’s modern Leviathan, contorting political power into social control. Gray (2023) argues that conflicts between liberalism and its dissenters are complex. He provides a pessimistic take on the convoluted and contradictory nature of Western hyper-liberal ideologies stating, Western hyper-liberalism is paradoxical in nature. It denies the historical culture that sprouted concepts like individual autonomy, human rights, and democracy, while exporting these ideas through moral absolutism and identity politics. The Russian revolution is analogous to Western hyper-liberalism. Like Russian revolutionaries, hyper-liberals are “swollen lumpen-intelligensia” and powerful political forces, believing that humans possess powers originally vested in deities involved in God-building. Gray (2023) asserts, “twenty-first century liberals can no more renounce their faith than could interwar communists: it is necessary for their mental survival” (p. 108). Both ideological systems have attempted to recreate society to fit an artificial state of human nature where humans are molded to fit societal expectations — …