According to Encyclopædia Britannica, "collectivism has found varying degrees of expression in the 20th century in such movements as socialism, communism, and fascism. ... In communist systems collectivist economics are carried to their furthest extreme, with a minimum of private ownership and a maximum of planned economy."

"Freedom's utter frustration in fascism is, indeed, the inevitable result of the liberal philosophy, which claims that power and compulsion are evil, that freedom demands their absence from human community. No such thing is possible; in a complex society this becomes apparent. This leaves no alternative but either to remain faithful to an illusionary idea of freedom and deny the reality of society, or to accept that reality and reject the idea of freedom. The first is the liberal's conclusion; the latter the fascist's. No other seems possible".

"The discarding of the market utopia brings us face to face with the reality of society. It is the dividing line between liberalism on one side, fascism and socialism on the other. The difference between the two is not primarily economic. It is moral and religious. Even when they profess identical economies, they are not only different but are indeed, embodiments of opposite principles. And the ultimate on which they separate is again freedom. By fascists and socialists alike the reality of society is accepted with the finality with which they knowledge of death has molded human consciousness. Power and compulsion are part of reality; an ideal that would ban them from society must be invalid. The issue on which they divide is whether in the light of this knowledge the idea of freedom can be upheld or not; is freedom an empty word, a temptation, designed to ruin man and his works, or can man reassert his freedom in the face of that knowledge and strive for its fulfillment in society without lapsing into moral illusionism?"

"...As long as he (man) is true to his task of creating more abundant freedom for all, he need not fear that either power or planning will turn against him and destroy the freedom he is building by their instrumentality. This is the meaning of freedom in a complex society; it gives us all the certainty that we need."

During the Industrial Revolution, the life expectancy of children increased dramatically. The percentage of children born in London who died before the age of five decreased from 74.5% in 1730-1749 to 31.8% in 1810-1829.
Public health measures are credited with much of the recent increase in life expectancy. During the 20th century, the average lifespan in the United States increased by more than 30 years,

The 19th century produced a phenomenon unheard of in the annals of Western civilization, namely, a hundred years' peace - 1815 - 1914. Apart from the Crimean War - a more or less colonial event - England, France, Prussia, Austria, Italy and Russia were engaged in war among each other for altogether only eighteen months. A computation of comparable figures for the two preceding centuries gives an average of sixty to seventy years of major wars in each. But even the fiercest of nineteenth-century conflagrations, the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71, ended after less than a year's duration with the defeated nation being able to pay over an unheard-of sum as an indemnity without any disturbance of the currencies involved.