In the 1960s Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram famously carried out a series of experiments that forever changed our perceptions of morality and free will. The subjects-or "teachers"-were instructed to administer electroshocks to a human "learner," with the shocks becoming progressively more powerful and painful.

Controversial but now strongly vindicated by the scientific community, these experiments attempted to determine to what extent people will obey orders from authority figures regardless of consequences. Milgram's book is one well worth the effort. It reveals an element of human being that is so easy to forget, especially given that our culture is so bent on denying any element of - or at least any potential for - evil within ourselves.

Obedience to Authority is Milgram's fascinating and troubling chronicle of his classic study and a vivid and persuasive explanation of his conclusions.

''... one of the most significant books I have read in more than two decades of reviewing" -Robert Kirsch, Los Angeles Times