| Building
upon his previous books about Marx, Hayek, and Rand, Total Freedom completes what Lingua Franca has called Sciabarra's "epic scholarly
quest" to reclaim dialectics, usually associated with the Marxian
left, as a methodology that can revivify libertarian thought. Part
One surveys the history of dialectics from the ancient Greeks through
the Austrian school of economics. Part Two investigates in detail
the work of Murray Rothbard as a leading modern libertarian, in whose
thought Sciabarra finds both dialectical and nondialectical elements.
Ultimately, Sciabarra aims for a dialectical-libertarian synthesis,
highlighting the need (not sufficiently recognized in liberalism)
to think of the "totality" of interconnections in a dynamic system
as the way to ensure human freedom while avoiding "totalitarianism"
(such as resulted from Marxism).
"Chris Sciabarra's Total Freedom is an astonishing work,
astonishing in the depth and breadth of its scholarship, in its
evidence of the use of the dialectic process by philosophers such
as Aristotle, in its discovery of dialectics in the work of economists
such as Murray Rothbard, and—most of all—in the first-handedness
of its author. Unlike so many other scholars and historians, Sciabarra
looks at the history of philosophy through his own eyes and his
own understanding. As a result, this beautifully and clearly written
book will make the reader reexamine the history of philosophy and
the history of dialectics by means of a new epistemological perspective:
the perspective of dialectics. Total Freedom is a landmark
in philosophical studies and interpretation." —Barbara Branden
"In a lucid, scholarily, and daringly original exercise in truly
independent thinking, Chris Sciabarra reclaims the concept of dialectics
and makes its methodology the foundation for a radical defense of
'the libertarian vision.' In his originality, Sciabarra is a man
ahead of his time. He stimulates us with fresh and provocative perspectives,
and challenges us to join him at the intellectual heights he so
persuasively traverses. Must reading for all those committed to
the ideal of a truly free society." — Nathaniel Branden |
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| Chris
Matthew Sciabarra has been a Visiting Scholar in the Department
of Politics at New York University since 1989. His previous publications
include Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical (PSP, 1995), Marx,
Hayek, and Utopia (SUNY, 1995), and Feminist Interpretations
of Ayn Rand (edited with Mimi Reisel Gladstein, PSP, 1999). |
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