RENT TEXTBOOKS

FREE SHIPPING BOTH WAYS

ON EVERY ORDER!

LIST PRICE:

$31.95

Sorry, this item is currently unavailable.

The Reactionary Mind Conservatism from Edmund Burke to Sarah Palin

by: Robin, Corey

ISBN: 9780199793747 | 0199793743

Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Pub. Date: 9/29/2011

Newer Edition Available

Why Rent from Knetbooks?

Because Knetbooks knows college students. Our rental program is designed to save you time and money. Whether you need a textbook for a semester, quarter or even a summer session, we have an option for you. Simply select a rental period, enter your information and your book will be on its way!

Top 5 reasons to order all your textbooks from Knetbooks:

We have the lowest prices on thousands of popular textbooks
Free shipping both ways on ALL orders
Most orders ship within 48 hours
Need your book longer than expected? Extending your rental is simple
Our customer support team is always here to help

Summary Table of Contents Author Biography

What is conservatism today? And what is its intellectual lineage? InThe Reactionary Mind, Corey Robin makes a strikingly bold claim about the right's intellectual foundations. He contends that from the eighteenth century through today, the right has been united by a defense of inequality and privilege and a deep hostility to all forms of progressive politics. The book ranges widely, locating the origins of conservative thought in the works of Edmund Burke and Joseph de Maistre before turning to figures such as John C. Calhoun, Friedrich Nietzsc... MOREhe, Ayn Rand, Friedrich Hayek, and even Sarah Palin. Robin acknowledges that there are differences among various thinkers and movements, but he stresses that focusing on internal conflict blinds us to the unifying "counterrevolutionary experience" that threads through modern history--the defense of class privilege and a profound aversion toward freedom and egalitarianism.

In The Reactionary Mind, political scientist Corey Robin makes a strikingly bold claim about the right's political and intellectual foundations. He contends that from the eighteenth century through today, the right has been united by a defense of inequality and privilege and by a deep hostility to all forms of progressive politics. The book ranges widely, covering figures as various as Edmund Burke and Antonin Scalia, John C. Calhoun and Ayn Rand, Joseph de Maistre andPhyllis Schlafly.

Late in life, William F. Buckley made a confession to Corey Robin. Capitalism is "boring," said the founding father of the American right. "Devoting your life to it," as conservatives do, "is horrifying if only because it's so repetitious. It's like sex." With this unlikely conversation began Robin's decade-long foray into the conservative mind. What is conservatism, and what's truly at stake for its proponents? If capitalism bores them, what excites them?

Tracing conservatism back to its roots in the reaction against the French Revolution, Robin argues that the right is fundamentally inspired by a hostility to emancipating the lower orders. Some conservatives endorse the free market, others oppose it. Some criticize the state, others celebrate it. Underlying these differences is the impulse to defend power and privilege against movements demanding freedom and equality.

Despite their opposition to these movements, conservatives favor a dynamic conception of politics and society--one that involves self-transformation, violence, and war. They are also highly adaptive to new challenges and circumstances. This partiality to violence and capacity for reinvention has been critical to their success.

Written by a keen, highly regarded observer of the contemporary political scene, The Reactionary Mind ranges widely, from Edmund Burke to Antonin Scalia, from John C. Calhoun to Ayn Rand. It advances the notion that all rightwing ideologies, from the eighteenth century through today, are historical improvisations on a theme: the felt experience of having power, seeing it threatened, and trying to win it back.

... MORE

Acknowledgments	p. ix
Epigraph	p. xiii
Introduction	p. 3
Profiles in Reaction
Conservatism and Counterrevolution	p. 41
The First Counterrevolutionary	p. 61
Garbage and Gravitas	p. 76
Inside Out	p. 97
The Ex-Cons	p. 109
Affirmative Action Baby	p. 130
Virtues of Violence
A Color-Coded Genocide	p. 151
Remembrance of Empires Past	p. 161
Protocols of Machismo	p. 184
Potomac Fever	p. 201
Easy to Be Hard	p. 217
Conclusion	p. 246
Notes	p. 249
Index	p. 281
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

Corey Robin teaches political science at Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center. His writings have appeared in the New York Times, Harper's, and the London Review of Books.

RENT TEXTBOOKS

The Reactionary Mind Conservatism from Edmund Burke to Sarah Palin

Why Rent from Knetbooks?

Top 5 reasons to order all your textbooks from Knetbooks:

Related Products