Description
While many Americans view the September 11th terrorist attack as the act of an anachronistic and dangerous sect, one that champions medieval and outmoded ideals, John Gray here argues that in fact the ideology of Al Qaeda is both Western and modern, a by-product of globalization's transnational capital flows and open borders. Indeed, according to Gray, Al Qaeda's utopian zeal to remake the world in its own image descends from the same Enlightenment creed that informed both the disastrous Soviet experiment and the new neoliberal dream of a global free market.
In this "excellent short introduction to modern thought" (The Guardian), first published in 2003, Gray warns that the United States, once a champion of revolutionary economic and social change, must now understand its new foes. He also confronts some of the faults he perceives in Western ideology: the faith that global development will eradicate war and hunger, trust in technology to address the coming catastrophe of population explosion, and the belief that democracy is an infallible institution that can serve as political panacea for all.
Author: John Gray
Publisher: New Press
Published: 07/07/2005
Pages: 145
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.45lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.40w x 0.50d
ISBN13: 9781565849877
ISBN10: 1565849876
BISAC Categories:
- Political Science | History & Theory | General
- Political Science | Comparative Politics
- Political Science | Political Ideologies | Communism, Post-Communism & Socialism
About the Author
John Gray is a political philosopher and former professor of European thought at the London School of Economics. He is the author of "False Dawn: The Delusions of Global Capitalism," "Two Faces of Liberalism," and "Al Qaeda and What It Means to Be Modern," all published by The New Press. He lives in London.
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