The End of History and the Last Man is a well-known book written by Francis Fukuyama. At first, the author started with the essay ‘The End of History’ which later transformed into one of the most discussed books in the international affairs. The key argument of the book is that the Western democracy represents the end point of history. In other words, once the democratic values prevail, they are impossible to be changed for something else. The author provides numerous references to the post-Cold war period and points out the how universal the Western democracy became throughout the world.

Primarily, the key idea of the book contradicts the vision of Karl Marx who predicted that capitalism will come as a new époque after communism. However, what Francis Fukuyama suggested was the idea of prevalence of the liberal democracy. His ideas were later discussed by many experts and faced a certain extend of criticism. For instance, such experts in international relations as Samuel Huntington and Henry Kissingers suggested alternative visions of the events in the 20th century. Stressing on the power and the rapid development on China as a global player can perceive the theory of Henry Kissinger perceived as alternative to the one proposed by Francis Fukuyama and Samuel Huntington in his “Clash of Civilizations” as well as the counter theory to that of Francis Fukuyama.

While evaluating the key ideas conveyed by Francis Fukuyama, one shall focus on the following. First and foremost, he suggests viewed history as an evolutionary process. This is not a cyclic account of making things, but a process of evolution that comes to end with the end point where history terminates. Symbolically, Francis Fukuyama find the end of the history with end of the Cold War and the establishment of the new world order where the democratic values prevailed. As for him, the liberalism with the working institutional structure should be the end point of fighting and clashes. However, the author faced a lot of criticism in the 21st century as such movements as ISIS gained the power and became a new threat for the global security. Moreover, their larger aim is to disrupt the functionality of the democratic institutions which also contradicts the ideas of Francis Fukuyama, too. That is why, history did not end with the prevalence of the democratic institutions and values, and one has still to continue the struggle for their freedoms. At the same time, Francis Fukuyama claimed that events still take place at the end of history, however he did not envisage that such threats as ISIS will be a concern for the 21st century.

In addition to that, the book holds an account that pessimism about the future of the humanity will take place in the 21st century, and this is one of the unavoidable features, which the population should be aware of. At the same time, he offered a valid point that the population will be unable to control technology with its growing impact in the 21st century. However, he did not demonstrate the connection between the technology and the functionality of the democratic institutions.

In the chapter one of the book, the author tries to explain the notion of the ‘End of the History’. According to the author, such notion significantly differs from the general understanding of the meaning of ‘events’. Fukuyama points out that Karl Marx first studied the notion of the end of history, but some of his claims were not realistic, as he could not envisage the futurologist tendencies in the world in the 21st century. Hence, the communist utopia was the concept, which Karl Marx did not manage to achieve. Then, Fukuyama goes back to Hegelian interpretations of the end of the history and the existing dialectics in the interpretations of the world events. Additionally, he also introduces his own vision of the future events and claims that the ‘The state that emerges at the end of history is liberal insofar as it recognizes and protects through a system of law man’s universal right to freedom, and democratic insofar as it exists only with the consent of the governed.’ (Fukuyama, 2012) Hence, he appeals to the democratic institutions as to the key point that changed a lot of elements of governance in the world after the 21st century.

However, some of his statements presented in the chapter 1 were certainly mistaken. In particular, he claims that there did not exist any large struggles that would be greater than the fight for democracy and the democratic institutions. Again, his claim mainly derives from the interpretations of the events that took place in the late 20th century and were driven by the two world wars and by the Cold War in the end of the twentieth century. He does not however offer an account that of what will happen in the 21st century and what specific threats the humanity should expect. In addition to that, the information on how to guard the democratic institutions and liberal democracy is also missing.

Overall, Francis Fukuyama proposes a powerful vision of the development of events in the context of prevalent liberal democracy. However, some of his ideas of the ‘end of history’ are no longer valid as they were proven incomplete and insufficiently proven by the events that took place in the 21st century, such at the threat deriving from the Middle East and ISIS.