The End of Commitment ─ Intellectuals, Revolutionaries, And Political Morality

To many intellectuals of the twentieth century, supporting communism seemed to be a good idea. A very good idea, in fact. Yet as the century wore on and the attractive theory proved to be repressive in practice, many of those same intellectuals abandoned what they had first enthusiastically embraced. Hollander (sociology emeritus, U. of Massachusetts) examines a variety of workers of the mind, including those who could not turn away from their previous commitment. Working at the level of personal morality as well as within the context of historical events, Hollander examines what it was within the experience of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe that attracted and repelled, how conditions in Vietnam, China, Cuba, Nicaragua, Ethiopia created questions, and how those in the West became disillusioned or resisted it. He closes with commentary about how the personal becomes the political, a situation where "no persuasion can penetrate." Annotation c2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Paul Hollander is professor emeritus of sociology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and author of the classic Anti-Americanism as well as Understanding Anti-Americanism; Political Will and Personal Belief; Decline and Discontent; The Many Faces of Socialism; and Political Pilgrims. He lives in Northampton, Massachusetts.