Selected by Newsweek as one of “14 nonfiction books you’ll want to read this fall” Fifty years after it first appeared, one of Noam Chomsky’s greatest essays will be published for the first time as a timely stand-alone book, with a new preface by the author As a nineteen-year-old undergraduate in 1947, Noam Chomsky was deeply affected by articles about the responsibility of intellectuals written by Dwight Macdonald, an editor of Partisan Review and then of Politics. Twenty years later, as the Vietnam War was escalating, Chomsky turned to the question himself, noting that "intellectuals are in a position to expose the lies of governments" and to analyze their "often hidden intentions." Originally published in the New York Review of Books, Chomsky's essay eviscerated the "hypocritical moralism of the past" (such as when Woodrow Wilson set out to teach Latin Americans "the art of good government") and exposed the shameful policies in Vietnam and the role of intellectuals in justifying it. Also included in this volume is the brilliant "The Responsibility of Intellectuals Redux," written on the tenth anniversary of 9/11, which makes the case for using privilege to challenge the state. As relevant now as it was in 1967, The Responsibility of Intellectuals reminds us that "privilege yields opportunity and opportunity confers responsibilities." All of us have choices, even in desperate times.

The influence of intellectuals is not only greater than in previous eras but also takes a very different form from that envisioned by those like Machiavelli and others who have wanted to directly influence rulers. It has not been by shaping the opinions or directing the actions of the holders of power that modern intellectuals have most influenced the course of events, but by shaping public opinion in ways that affect the actions of power holders in democratic societies, whether or not those power holders accept the general vision or the particular policies favored by intellectuals. Even government leaders with disdain or contempt for intellectuals have had to bend to the climate of opinion shaped by those intellectuals. Intellectuals and Society not only examines the track record of intellectuals in the things they have advocated but also analyzes the incentives and constraints under which their views and visions have emerged. One of the most surprising aspects of this study is how often intellectuals have been proved not only wrong, but grossly and disastrously wrong in their prescriptions for the ills of society -- and how little their views have changed in response to empirical evidence of the disasters entailed by those views.

The German Democratic Republic has become the subject of novels, memoirs and films, and the backdrop for general debates over the power of intellectuals in contemporary media and society. This collection considers the demise of the GDR and its impact on the place of intellectuals.

In this book Ron Eyerman examines the role of intellectuals in the new modern order, considering the impact of recent social changes on the nature of contemporary intellectual culture.

Considering Class: Theory, Culture and Media in the 21st Century offers the reader international and interdisciplinary perspectives on the importance of class analysis in the 21st century. Political economists, sociologists, educationalists, ethnographers, cultural and media analysts combine to provide a multi-dimensional account of current class dynamics. The crisis consists precisely in the gap between the objective reality and efficacy of class forces shaping international politics and the relative paucity of class-consciousness at a popular level and appreciation of class as an explanatory optic at a theoretical level. This important book shows why the process of reconstructing class consciousness must also take place on the ground of cultural and subjective formation where everyday values, habits and media practices are in play. Contributors are: Anita Biressi, Joseph Choonara, Maurizio Donato, Danny Dorling, Mark Gibson, Craig Haslop, Dave Hill, Peter Jakobsson, Marina Kabat, Holly Lewis, Catherine Lumby, Lisa Mckenzie, Tony Moore, Adrian Murray, Deirdre O’Neill, Jonathan Pratschke, Michael Seltzer, Eduardo Sartelli, Fredrik Stiernstedt, Roberto Taddeo, Mike Wayne, Milly Williamson, Ferruh Yılmaz.

This book explores the role of intellectuals in politics and social change from traditional society to the present. Its theoretical structure is based upon six distinct types of intellectual activity. The rise and decline of specific types is analyzed in the historical context of industrialization, technological change, shifting social forces, and the emergence of popular movements.

Incorporating a rich series of case-studies covering a range of geographical areas, this collection of essays examines the history of modern intellectuals in the Islamic world throughout the twentieth century. The contributors reassess the typology and history of various scholars, providing significant diachronic analysis of the different forms of communication, learning, and authority. While each chapter presents a separate regional case, with an historically and geographically different background, the volume discloses commonalities, similarities and intellectual echoes through its comparative approach. Consisting of two parts, the volume focuses first on al-Manar, the influential journal published between 1898 and 1935 that inspired much imagination and arguments among local intelligentsias all over the Islamic world. The second part discusses the formation, transmission and transformation of learning and authority, from the Middle East to Central and Southeast Asia. Constituting a milestone in comparative studies of the modern Islamic world, this book highlights the range of and transformation in the role of intellectuals in Islamic societies.

This book reveals the sense in which our postmodern societies are characterized by the obscene absence of the intellectual. The modern intellectual--who had once been associated with humanism and enlightenment—has in our day been replaced by media stars, talking heads, and technical experts. At issue is the ongoing crisis of democracy, under the aegis of the société du spectacle and its vast networks of politically-induced idiocy, industrially-produced biocide, and militarily-provoked genocide. Spectacle fills the resulting moral and intellectual vacuum with electronic technologies of control, punishment, and destruction. This postmodern tyranny reduces intelligence to mechanistic, positivist, and grammatological models of inquiry, while increasing the segmentation, fragmentation, and dissolution of human existence. The apotheosis of the spectacle explains the intellectual void that lies at the heart of our postmodern decadence; it also accounts for the need to recuperate the humanist values of enlightenment promoted by the modern intellectual tradition.

Featuring a collection of original chapters by leading and emerging scholars, The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Sociology presents a comprehensive and balanced overview of the major topics and emerging trends in the discipline of sociology today. Features original chapters contributed by an international cast of leading and emerging sociology scholars Represents the most innovative and 'state-of-the-art' thinking about the discipline Includes a general introduction and section introductions with chapters summaries by the editor