The Conquest of Politics

Does political philosophy have anything significant to say to citizens facing the real political world in a modern democracy? Addressing the thought of six major twentieth-century philosophers--Bertrand Russell, John Rawls, Robert Nozick, Bruce Ackerman, Michael Oakeshott, and Alasdair MacIntyre--Benjamin Barber maintains that each of them has aided in the "conquest of politics" by abstract and speculative philosophy. They and others have focused on philosophy, particularly "thinking about thinking," to the neglect of the rough-and-ready situations of the political arena. In this lively and accessible book Barber proposes a way of doing political philosophy that takes practical politics into account: the equality and mutuality of theory and practice, he argues, should be the aim of engaged political thought suited to a democratic age.