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Reflections on The Causes of Human Misery and Upon Certain Proposals to Eliminate Them

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This book is essays makes one wonder if it is something in the character of the American right. Pomposity of manner, certainly. The manner of one who would be thought wise. These days, the truly wise must deploy some tough, no-nonsense realism. So in chapter two, Moore points out that cruelty and violence are largely used in the world, either to maintain the status quo, or to alter it. But that hard-bitten realism is not enough. We need too the strength of ‘major sociological generalisation’ to support that sense of a mind ranging far and wide across human experience. The book also deals with government, intellectual freedom and imperialism in a similar manner, demonstrating along the way that Lenin would have been as nasty as Stalin given the chance, that we ought in the interests of freedom to invite a Nazi to give a few university lectures, and that really America isn’t dominant in the world at all, not really. The last chapter considers the future of America. The reactionaries might win. The reformists might win. The revolutionaries might win (not very likely). There might just be chaos. We must certainly be sombre about the future. Though remember, ‘a sombre view is not a passive and fatalist one’. Carry on reflecting. (https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/barker-c/1973/09/reflections.html)

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Availability

120005042

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Detail Information

Series Title

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Call Number

973.91092

Publisher

Boston : Beacon Press., 1972

Collation

xviii + 201 p.; 21 cm

Language

English

ISBN/ISSN

0-8070-1530-X

Classification

973.91092

Edition

2

Subject(s)

Social conditions - United States
Political sociology

Specific Detail Info

Includes bibliographical references and index

Statement of Responsibility

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