Fairness and Freedom

David Hackett Fischer's 2012 comparative history of the United States and New Zealand — arguing that Americans organize social life around freedom while New Zealanders organize it around fairness — and that these different founding values create distinctive national characters.

Provides a comparative framework for understanding American and New Zealand national character — Fairness and Freedom demonstrates that the choice between freedom and fairness as primary social values (both legitimate) creates systematically different political cultures, institutions, and social outcomes.