Dear Professor Fukuyama,

I write to you not in denial of liberal democracy, but in affirmation of it — on one condition: that it must be genuine, not hollow. Your thesis of the "end of history" once illuminated an era when humanity placed its highest hopes in freedom and democracy. I do not deny that light; I only ask that we confront its shadows.

Freedom cannot stand in the void; it must be rooted in a moral order. Its correct sequence is, I believe:

Justice → Equality → Rule of Law → Democracy → Freedom.

Without justice, equality cannot exist.

Without equality, the rule of law is an empty shell.

Without true rule of law, democracy becomes a mirage.

And when democracy is hollow, freedom devolves into a privilege of the few.

Permit me a sharper question: do you not see that the modern enterprise is, in essence, a feudal and authoritarian structure? Corporations are the cells of liberal democracies, yet they lack democratic DNA. If economic life is organized as hierarchy and obedience, can political democracy alone redeem freedom?

Some may respond: "But people are free to form or join cooperatives." Then why has the cooperative model never become the mainstream of market economies? Is it not ironic that the most democratic form of enterprise is marginalized in so-called free markets?

The common objection is efficiency. But efficiency need not be sacrificed for democracy. Recursive representation proves this:

• Level 0: every 100 members elect one L1 delegate.

• Level 1: every 100 L1 delegates elect one L2 delegate.

• … and so forth.

Through such a structure, thousands or even millions can be represented in real time, with only a handful of L2 delegates needed for collective decision-making. Efficiency and democracy can coexist. Mondragón has not fully employed this model, but in theory, it demonstrates that democratic organization need not be condemned to inefficiency.

Ironically, Friedrich Hayek’s theory aligns far more closely with cooperative market liberalism than with corporate oligarchy.

• It honors spontaneous order.

• It resists central planning.

• It cherishes freedom of choice.

• It recognizes dispersed knowledge.

What, then, is a federation of cooperatives if not Hayek’s spontaneous order made flesh? Why is it that the truest form of market democracy — the cooperative — remains a footnote in liberal capitalism?

And perhaps we must go further, to Adam Smith himself. The “invisible hand” was never meant as a license for greed. In The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith made it clear: the true invisible hand arises not from unrestrained appetite but from moral sentiments — from people tolerating, compromising, and cooperating to form social consensus.

Markets are not autonomous gods but ethical mechanisms embedded in society. If so, then cooperative market democracy is not a deviation but the most faithful realization of Smith’s vision.

Allow me a fable of the year 2100:

A citizen wakes to find breakfast prepared by AI, and a personalized menu of endless entertainments. Labor is obsolete; no one hungers.

Yet when she applies to have a child, the Population Bureau coldly refuses: her quota is exhausted.

When she voices dissent in a virtual forum, the Thought Prevention Department dispatches psychological guidance.

When loneliness strikes, the State assigns her a virtual family and virtual offspring.

Freedom, democracy, and equality exist only in name. Humanity is domesticated into a pastoral species, kept docile with abundance and illusion. History ends not with liberal democracy, but with the fusion of old hierarchies and new technologies, producing eternal feudalism.

Professor Fukuyama, without cognitive emancipation and sovereignty of thought, can freedom survive?

If justice and equality are eroded, do rule of law and democracy not become rituals without substance?

If corporations remain feudal, and cooperatives remain marginal, is not freedom itself a façade?

Tell me, then: are we free?

And you — are you free? 🤡

Respectfully,

— A believer in freedom still

Dear Professor Fukuyama,

I write to you not in denial of liberal democracy, but in affirmation of it — on one condition: that it must be genuine, not hollow. Your thesis of the "end of history" once illuminated an era when humanity placed its highest hopes in freedom and democracy. I do not deny that light; I only ask that we confront its shadows.

Freedom cannot stand in the void; it must be rooted in a moral order. Its correct sequence is, I believe:

Justice → Equality → Rule of Law → Democracy → Freedom.

Without justice, equality cannot exist.

Without equality, the rule of law is an empty shell.

Without true rule of law, democracy becomes a mirage.

And when democracy is hollow, freedom devolves into a privilege of the few.

Permit me a sharper question: do you not see that the modern enterprise is, in essence, a feudal and authoritarian structure? Corporations are the cells of liberal democracies, yet they lack democratic DNA. If economic life is organized as hierarchy and obedience, can political democracy alone redeem freedom?

Some may respond: "But people are free to form or join cooperatives." Then why has the cooperative model never become the mainstream of market economies? Is it not ironic that the most democratic form of enterprise is marginalized in so-called free markets?

The common objection is efficiency. But efficiency need not be sacrificed for democracy. Recursive representation proves this:

• Level 0: every 100 members elect one L1 delegate.

• Level 1: every 100 L1 delegates elect one L2 delegate.

• … and so forth.

Through such a structure, thousands or even millions can be represented in real time, with only a handful of L2 delegates needed for collective decision-making. Efficiency and democracy can coexist. Mondragón has not fully employed this model, but in theory, it demonstrates that democratic organization need not be condemned to inefficiency.

Ironically, Friedrich Hayek’s theory aligns far more closely with cooperative market liberalism than with corporate oligarchy.

• It honors spontaneous order.

• It resists central planning.

• It cherishes freedom of choice.

• It recognizes dispersed knowledge.

What, then, is a federation of cooperatives if not Hayek’s spontaneous order made flesh? Why is it that the truest form of market democracy — the cooperative — remains a footnote in liberal capitalism?

And perhaps we must go further, to Adam Smith himself. The “invisible hand” was never meant as a license for greed. In The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith made it clear: the true invisible hand arises not from unrestrained appetite but from moral sentiments — from people tolerating, compromising, and cooperating to form social consensus.

Markets are not autonomous gods but ethical mechanisms embedded in society. If so, then cooperative market democracy is not a deviation but the most faithful realization of Smith’s vision.

Allow me a fable of the year 2100:

A citizen wakes to find breakfast prepared by AI, and a personalized menu of endless entertainments. Labor is obsolete; no one hungers.

Yet when she applies to have a child, the Population Bureau coldly refuses: her quota is exhausted.

When she voices dissent in a virtual forum, the Thought Prevention Department dispatches psychological guidance.

When loneliness strikes, the State assigns her a virtual family and virtual offspring.

Freedom, democracy, and equality exist only in name. Humanity is domesticated into a pastoral species, kept docile with abundance and illusion. History ends not with liberal democracy, but with the fusion of old hierarchies and new technologies, producing eternal feudalism.

Professor Fukuyama, without cognitive emancipation and sovereignty of thought, can freedom survive?

If justice and equality are eroded, do rule of law and democracy not become rituals without substance?

If corporations remain feudal, and cooperatives remain marginal, is not freedom itself a façade?

Tell me, then: are we free?

And you — are you free? 🤡

Respectfully,

— A believer in freedom still