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1945 book by Karl Popper

The Open Society and Its Enemies is a work on political philosophy by the philosopher Karl Popper, in which the author presents a "defence of the open society against its enemies", and offers a critique of theories of teleological historicism, according to which history unfolds inexorably according to universal laws. Popper indicts Plato, Hegel, and Marx for relying on historicism to underpin their political philosophies. Written during World War II, The Open Society and Its Enemies was published in 1945 in London by Routledge in two volumes: "The Spell of Plato" and "The High Tide of Prophecy: Hegel, Marx, and the Aftermath". A one volume edition with a new introduction by Alan Ryan and an essay by E. H. Gombrich was published by Princeton University Press in 2013. The work was listed as one of the Modern Library Board's 100 Best Nonfiction books of the 20th century. The book critiques historicism and defends the open society and liberal democracy. Popper argues that Plato's political philosophy has dangerous tendencies towards totalitarianism, contrary to the benign idyll portrayed by most interpreters. He praises Plato's analysis of social change but rejects his solutions, which he sees as driven by fear of change brought about by the rise of democracies, and as contrary to the humanitarian and democratic views of Socrates and other thinkers of the Athenian "Great Generation". Popper also criticizes Hegel, tracing his ideas to Aristotle and arguing that they were at the root of 20th century totalitarianism. He agrees with Schopenhauer's view that Hegel "was a flat headed, insipid, nauseating, illiterate charlatan, who reached the pinnacle of audacity in scribbling together and dishing up the craziest mystifying nonsense." Popper criticizes Marx at length for his historicism, which he believes led him to overstate his case, and rejects his radical and revolutionary outlook. Popper advocates for direct liberal democracy as the only form of government that allows institutional improvements without violence and bloodshed.

Popper's book is divided into two volumes, which were only published as one volume in more recent editions. The first volume, The Spell of Plato, focuses on Plato, and the second volume, The High Tide of Prophecy, focuses on Karl Marx. Popper argues that the historicist approach gives poor results, and he outlines a method that he believes would yield better results. He also discusses how historicism originated and became entrenched in our culture. Popper provides "the doctrine of the chosen people" as an example of historicism. The doctrine assumes that God has chosen one people to be the selected instrument of His will, and that this people will inherit the earth

Chapter 3, "Plato's Theory of Forms or Ideas", discusses the eponymous theory. It is longer than the first two chapters, and is divided by Popper into six parts. According to Popper, Plato's philosophy was heavily influenced by his experiences of political turmoil and instability, and he believed that moral degeneration leads to political degeneration. He strove to arrest this political change by establishing a state that does not degenerate or change, which he saw as the perfect state of the Golden Age. While Plato deviated from the tenets of historicism by believing in an ideal state that does not change, he shared with Heraclitus a tendency to shrink back from the last consequences of historicism. This chapter introduces Popper's distinction between the social engineer and the historicist, of which he favors the former. The social engineer believes that humans can control history to achieve their goals, and sees politics as a tool to build and modify social institutions; he evaluates institutions based on their design, efficiency, and other practical factors. (Popper identifies two types of social engineering: piecemeal and utopian, which he further discusses in chapter nine.) In contrast, the historicist is interested in understanding the past, present, and future significance of institutions. They evaluate institutions based on their historical role, such as if they are divinely willed or serving important historical trends. Popper acknowledges that institutions are not simply machines and can have unique characteristics beyond their practical purpose. This chapter also introduces Popper's distinction between  two different methods of understanding things: methodological essentialism and methodological nominalism, of which he favors the latter. Methodological essentialism is the view that science should aim to uncover the hidden reality or essence of things through intellectual intuition and to describe it in words through definitions. Methodological nominalism, by contrast, emphasizes the importance of describing how things behave in different situations, and especially whether there are any regularities in their behavior. According to Popper, natural sciences mostly use methodological nominalism, while the social sciences still rely on essentialist methods, which is one of the reasons for their backwardness. Popper notes that some people argue that the difference in method between natural and social sciences reflects an essential difference between the two fields, but he disagrees with this view.

Chapter 4, "Change and Rest", describes Plato's sociology as based on the theory of Forms and universal flux and decay. It is long, and divided into five parts. According to Popper, Plato believed change can only lead towards imperfection and evil, which is a process of degeneration – he saw history as an illness, and set out a system of historical periods governed by a law of evolution. Plato's ideal state was not a progressive Utopian vision of the future, but rather a historical or even pre historical one that attempted to reconstruct ancient tribal aristocracies to avoid class war. The ruling class in Plato's best state has an unchallengeable superiority and education. Breeding and training of the ruling class was necessary for ensuring stability, and Plato demanded the same principles be applied as in breeding dogs, horses, or birds. Popper summarizes Plato's systematic historicist sociology, which was an attempt to understand and interpret the changing social world. Chapter 5, "Nature and Convention", introduces Popper's distinction between natural laws and normative laws. and then applies it to a further analysis of Plato. which combine elements of magical monism and critical dualism. Utopian engineering requires a blueprint of the ideal society, in rough outline at least, and determines practical action by considering the best means for realizing the ultimate political aim. In 2019, the book was released in audiobook format for the first time, narrated by Liam Gerrard. The audiobook was produced by arrangement with the University of Klagenfurt/Karl Popper Library, by Tantor Media, a division of Recorded Books.

Popper's book remains one of the most popular defenses of Western liberal values in the post World War II era. Gilbert Ryle, reviewing Popper's book just two years after its publication and agreeing with him, wrote that Plato "was Socrates' Judas." The Open Society and Its Enemies was praised by the philosophers Bertrand Russell, who called it "a work of first class importance" and "a vigorous and profound defence of democracy", and Sidney Hook who called it a "subtly argued and passionately written" critique of the "historicist ideas that threaten the love of freedom [and] the existence of an open society". Hook calls Popper's critique of the cardinal beliefs of historicism "undoubtedly sound", noting that historicism "overlooks the presence of genuine alternatives in history, the operation of plural causal processes in the historical pattern, and the role of human ideals in redetermining the future". Nevertheless, Hook argues that Popper "reads Plato too literally when it serves his purposes and is too cocksure about what Plato's 'real' meaning is when the texts are ambiguous", and calls Popper's treatment of Hegel "downright abusive" and "demonstrably false", noting that "there is not a single reference to Hegel in Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf", though neither does Popper refer to Hitler. Some other philosophers were critical. Walter Kaufmann believed that Popper's work has many virtues, including its attack against totalitarianism, and many suggestive ideas. However, he also found it to have serious flaws, writing that Popper's interpretations of Plato were flawed and that Popper had provided a "comprehensive statement" of older myths about Hegel. Kaufmann commented that despite Popper's hatred of totalitarianism, Popper's method was "unfortunately similar to that of totalitarian 'scholars'". In his The Open Philosophy and the Open Society: A Reply to Dr. Karl Popper's Refutations of Marxism (1968), the Marxist author Maurice Cornforth defended Marxism against Popper's criticisms. Though disagreeing with Popper, Cornforth nevertheless called him "perhaps the most eminent" critic of Marxism. The philosopher Robert C. Solomon writes that Popper directs an "almost wholly unjustified polemic" against Hegel, one which has helped to give Hegel a reputation as a "moral and political reactionary". The Marxist economist Ernest Mandel identifies The Open Society and Its Enemies as part of a literature, beginning with German social democrat Eduard Bernstein, that criticizes the dialectical method Marx borrowed from Hegel as "useless", "metaphysical", or "mystifying." He faults Popper and the other critics for their "positivist narrowness". The political theorist Rajeev Bhargava argues that Popper "notoriously misreads Hegel and Marx", and that the formulation Popper deployed to defend liberal political values is "motivated by partisan ideological considerations grounded curiously in the most abstract metaphysical premises". In Jon Stewart's anthology The Hegel Myths and Legends (1996), The Open Society and Its Enemies is listed as a work that has propagated "myths" about Hegel. Stephen Houlgate writes that while Popper's accusation that Hegel sought to deceive others by use of dialectic is famous, it is also ignorant, as is Popper's charge that Hegel's account of sound and heat in the Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences is "gibberish" although he does not elaborate further what specifically Hegel meant. The Open Society Foundations, created by investor George Soros, were inspired in name and purpose by Popper's book. The philosopher Joseph Agassi credits Popper with showing that historicism is a factor common to both fascism and Bolshevism.