Books

8�. viii, 184 p. *** First edition, third printing, still predating the first American edition. *** Binding scuffed, with a few rim-formed stains (repeatedly having served as a stand for water glasses), cloth layer slightly damaged at spine. No dust jacket. In contrast to the worn exterior, the interior is in almost fine condition, apart from the usual slight browning of the war-time paper, and slight foxing to the endpapers and last pages. Traces of a removed (bookseller?) label on front flyleaf. *** Flyleaf with ownership inscription "H. Middelmann, 1944" and later personal dedication "To Hans Middlemann/ With best wishes/ FA Hayek 29-3-78". *** The copy of German banker Hans Middelmann, who fled fascism in the late 1930s and emigrated to South Africa. As a 19-year old, he had studied with Hayek in London. He obviously bought the book as soon as it was available in South Africa. Middelmann became an important figure in the economy of apartheid South Africa, being on the boards of Colonial Mutual and some of the biggest banks in the country, as well as in the university board of UCT. He also was in the board of the Open Society Foundation in South Africa, propagating Popperian ideas, and had links to the Free Market Society. He met Hayek again when the latter visited South Africa in 1978, the occasion on which Hayek inscribed the book to him. *** A nice association copy that has been read and put to use, in my view adding history to it.

"The Road to Serfdom," written by Friedrich Hayek in 1944, is a seminal text that critiques centralized economic planning and collectivism. Hayek argues that state control over the economy inevitably leads to a loss of personal freedoms and the rise of authoritarianism. He emphasizes the importance of free markets and individual liberty as essential defenses against the encroachment of totalitarian rule. The book remains a powerful discourse on the relationship between economic systems and political freedom, warning of the dangers of surrendering too much power to the state.