Books > Humanities > Philosophy > Topics in philosophy > Social & political philosophy
|
Buy Now
Not Thinking like a Liberal (Hardcover)
Loot Price: R684
Discovery Miles 6 840
|
|
Not Thinking like a Liberal (Hardcover)
Expected to ship within 12 - 17 working days
|
In a compelling meditation on the ideas that shape our lives, one
of the world's most provocative and creative philosophers explains
how his eccentric early years influenced his lifelong critique of
liberalism. Liberalism is so amorphous and pervasive that for most
people in the West it is background noise, the natural state of
affairs. But there are nooks and crannies in every society where
the prevailing winds don't blow. Raymond Geuss grew up some
distance from the cultural mainstream and recounts here the unusual
perspective he absorbed: one in which liberal capitalism was
synonymous with moral emptiness and political complacency. Not
Thinking like a Liberal is a concise tour of diverse intellectual
currents-from the Counter-Reformation and communism to pragmatism
and critical theory-that shaped Geuss's skeptical stance toward
liberalism. The bright young son of a deeply Catholic steelworker,
Geuss was admitted in 1959 to an unusual boarding school on the
outskirts of Philadelphia. Outside was Eisenhower's America. Inside
Geuss was schooled by Hungarian priests who tried to immunize
students against the twin dangers of oppressive communism and vapid
liberal capitalism. From there Geuss went on to university in New
York in the early days of the Vietnam War and to West Germany,
where critical theory was experiencing a major revival. This is not
a repeatable journey. In tracing it, Geuss reminds us of the
futility of abstracting lessons from context and of seeking a
universal view from nowhere. At the same time, he examines the rise
and fall of major political theories of the past sixty years. An
incisive thinker attuned to both the history and the future of
ideas, Geuss looks beyond the horrors of authoritarianism and the
shallow freedom of liberalism to glimpse a world of genuinely new
possibilities.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!
|
You might also like..
|
Email address subscribed successfully.
A activation email has been sent to you.
Please click the link in that email to activate your subscription.