Francis Fukuyama with Shadi Hamid: In the Realm of the Last Man — 92NY Talks Podcast 500

What did Francis Fukuyama mean when he declared that the world had reached “the end of history” — and does he still believe it?

One of the most consequential conservative political thinkers of our time, best known for his international bestseller The End of History and the Last Man and for his work advising the presidential administrations of Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, Francis Fukuyama has spent decades shaping the way policymakers, scholars, and everyday citizens think about power and the fate of liberal democracy. Now, with In the Realm of the Last Man, he offers a strikingly personal new intellectual memoir and a reflection on the ideas and policies he’s reconsidered — a life story that doubles as a history of liberalism and political disillusionment over the last 50 years.

In his new memoir, Fukuyama’s lens turns inward for the first time, tracing his evolution from a young student in the orbit of conservative intellectual legend Allan Bloom to his years in the halls of power in Washington, DC. Opening up about his Japanese American family history, including his relatives’ internment during World War II, he reflects with unusual candor on the experiences that changed his thinking — including his public break with neoconservatism over the Iraq War.

In a wide-ranging and reflective conversation with author and political scientist Shadi Hamid, hear Fukuyama discuss how his ideas were transformed by his lived experience and how the crises of the 21st century have altered his understanding of democracy’s future.

Expect a return to the concepts central to Fukuyama’s work — the qualities that define human nature, the value of democratic institutions, and his controversial theory of the “Last Man” at the end of history — a rare encounter with a major thinker measuring his own life against the convulsions of history.