# Francis Fukuyama Political scientist (Stanford) best known for the "end of history" thesis (1989/1992) — that liberal democracy is the terminal form of human government — and later for major works on political order and identity politics. A former neoconservative who broke with the movement over the Iraq War, he has become one of the more prominent institutionalist critics of the Trump-era right and of the tech-authoritarian currents around [[Peter Thiel]], with whom he has publicly debated for decades (including sharing an Aspen Ideas Festival panel in July 2026 where Thiel attacked [[Pope Leo XIV]]).