The Torment of Secrecy ― The Background and Consequences of American Security Policies

Edward Shils's The Torment of Secrecy is one of the few minor classics to emerge from the cold war years of anticommunism and McCarthyism in the United States. Mr. Shils's "torment" is not only that of the individual caught up in loyalty and security procedures; it is also the torment of the accuser and judge. This essay in sociological analysis and political philosophy considers the cold war preoccupation with espionage, sabotage, and subversion at home, assessing the magnitude of such threats and contrasting it to the agitation - by lawmakers, investigators, and administrators - so wildly directed against the "enemy." Mr. Shils, widely regarded as one of the world's most influential social thinkers, has written an examination of a recurring American characteristic that is as timely as ever.

Edward A. Shils was distinguished service professor of sociology at the University of Chicago until his death in 1995. He founded the journal Minerva and co-founded the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, and was widely regarded as one of the world’s most influential social thinkers.