Reinhold Niebuhr And Non-utopian Liberalism: Beyond Illusion And Despair

"One of the many virtues of Eyal Naveh's splendid work is that it places Niebuhr's thought in a broad intellectual context. By examining a wide-ranging group of writers and intellectuals who commented on Niebuhr's work, Naveh succeeds, as no other scholar has, in explaining the nature of the 'discourse' that arose around the central concept of non-utopian liberalism. Naveh sheds light on how Niebuhr came to reject the notion that people were essentially rational and beneficent, a notion he considered overly idealistic and sentimental... By examining the discourse that developed around Niebuhr's central ideas, this book helps explain much about the changing contours of American thought in the twentieth century. Reinhold Niebuhr died in 1971; thirty years later the World Trade Center in New York City was destroyed by terrorists. In the aftermath of September 11, Naveh explains, Niebuhr's insight into situations of crisis can indeed invigorate American politics and culture, and may yet serve as an antidote to the illusions and sense of complacency that have too frequently dominated American life in recent decades." -- From the Foreword by Professor Richard Polenberg, Cornell University.Naveh, Eyal is the author of 'Reinhold Niebuhr And Non-utopian Liberalism: Beyond Illusion And Despair', published 2002 under ISBN 9781845190965 and ISBN 1845190963.