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In this intellectual biography of one of the most important political thinkers of the twentieth century, David T. Byrne reveals the fascinating life of James Burnham. Beginning his intellectual career as a disciple of Leon Trotsky, Burnham preached socialist revolution to the American working classes during the Great Depression. In 1940 he split with Trotsky over the nature of the USSR. Attempting to explain the world that was emerging in the early days of World War II, Burnham penned one of the most successful political works of the early 1940s, titled The Managerial Revolution. This dystopian treatise predicted collectivization and rule by bland managers and bureaucrats. Burnham's next boo...
Written in 1941, Burnham's claim was that capitalism was dead, but that it was being replaced not by socialism, but a new economic system he called "managerialism"; rule by managers.
James Burnham’s 1964 classic, Suicide of the West, remains a startling account on the nature of the modern era. It offers a profound, in depth analysis of what is happening in the world today by putting into focus the intangible, often vague doctrine of American liberalism. It parallels the loosely defined liberal ideology rampant in American government and institutions, with the flow, ebb, growth, climax and the eventual decline and death of both ancient and modern civilizations. Its author maintains that western suicidal tendencies lie not so much in the lack of resources or military power, but through an erosion of intellectual, moral, and spiritual factors abundant in modern western society and the mainstay of liberal psychology. Devastating in its relentless dissection of the liberal syndrome, this book will lead many liberals to painful self-examination, buttress the thinking conservative’s viewpoint, and incite others, no doubt, to infuriation. None can ignore it.
This book is organized into three distinct parts: "The American System of Government," "The Present Position of Congress," and "The Future of Congress," which discusses democracy and liberty, and ultimately asks, "Can Congress survive?"
As Kelly's fascinating biography makes clear, James Burnham was one of the most influential anticommunist figures of the Cold War era. His story is for anyone who wants a better understanding of the forces behind this major ideological clash.
James Burnham began his intellectual career in the 1930s as a Trotskyist. However, world events and his personal experiences within the Trotskyist movement convinced him that all forms of Marxism must be totalitarian, and he left the world of Marxism in 1940. This book focuses especially upon Mr. Burnham's career as a senior editor with William F. Buckley, Jr.'s National Review, putting him within the context of the conservative intellectual movement as a whole. Burnham, despite what he called his 'hard' anticommunist public stance, served as a moderating pragmatic force within National Review and American conservatism. He urged fellow conservatives to accept a minimum welfare state, to work within the established two-party system, and to adopt a tough but realistic foreign policy. Contents: From Left to ?; Lenin's Heir and Beyond; Burning His Bridges; Whither Conservatism?; The Ideology of Western Suicide; Sectarian and Doctrinaire Clannishness; Mr. Burnham; Epilogue; Selected Bibliography.
This book examines key twentieth-century philosophers, theologians, and social scientists who began their careers with commitments to the political left only later to reappraise or reject them. Their reevaluation of their own previous positions reveals not only the change in their own thought but also the societal changes in the culture, economics, and politics to which they were reacting. By exploring the evolution of the political thought of these philosophers, this book draws connections among these thinkers and schools and discovers the general trajectory of twentieth-century political thinking in the West.
This volume draws on Hayek's shorter articles for weeklies, and his reviews, as well as academic papers and articles. It also includes a substantial introduction, providing full background and outlining the significance of this period for Hayek's intellectual development. The material is divided into three sections: Hayek's contributions to the famous market socialism debate; Hayek's responses to the onset of war, including his response to Keynes' How to Pay for the War; his papers on the relationship between economic planning and freedom.
A fascinating, immensely readable biography of one of the most important radical intellectuals of the twentieth century.
This first biography of Nicolas Nabokov (1903-78) reevaluates the role of the Russian-born American composer as a postwar cultural force, notably as secretary general of the Congress for Cultural Freedom in the 1950s and 1960s, and the contribution to twentieth-century music of this collaborator of Diaghilev, Stravinsky, and Balanchine.