Böcker av Michael Ignatieff

From renowned intellectual and historian Michael Ignatieff comes a moving portrait of artists, writers, politicians, emperors, and poets overcoming tragedy and crisis an ancient tradition of consolation which will resonate with readers in our turbulent times.

Reissue of an incisive exploration of the many faces of modern nationalism by the esteemed author of On Consolation

Reissue of a profound exploration of the concept of human need by the esteemed author of On Consolation

Poring over his grandparents' memoirs, grainy photographs of his distinguished ancestors and relating family lore passed from father to son, Michael Ignatieff begins a moving journey to come to terms with his inheritance that is bound up with the violent tumult of Russian history. With great care and complexity, Ignatieff reconstructs a vanished way of life. Beginning in the opulent court of Catherine the Great, he traces his family's rise to great influence in the imperial regime of Tsar Nicholas II before the country is swept up in revolution, civil war and exile. A profound meditation on rootlessness and belonging, The Russian Album explores both how we are formed by our pasts, but also how we must write our own stories in the present.

Isaiah Berlin was one of the great public intellectuals of his time. A magnetic speaker and beacon of liberal philosophy, he gained first-hand experience of some of the pivotal events of the twentieth century and crossed paths with luminaries from Virginia Woolf to Sigmund Freud. Declining to write an autobiography, Berlin instead agreed to give extensive interviews to acclaimed writer Michael Ignatieff in the final decade of his life. The result is a magisterial biography that penetrates deeply into Berlin's life and thought while capturing his vivid style of conversation. Reissued in this updated edition, it traces Berlin's journey to become one of his era's most vigorous defenders of liberty and individuality in the face of tyranny and dogma.

During a 3-year 8-nation journey, Michael Ignatieff found that while human rights is the language of states and liberal elites, the moral language that resonates with most people is that of everyday virtues: tolerance, forgiveness, trust, and resilience. These ordinary virtues are the moral system of global cities and obscure shantytowns alike.

Academic freedom-the institutional autonomy of scientific, research and teaching institutions, and the freedom of individual scholars and researchers to pursue controversial research and publish controversial opinions-is a cornerstone of any free society. Today this freedom is under attack from the state in many countries-Russia, Turkey, Venezuela, Hungary, China-but it is also under question from within academe. Bitter disputes have erupted on American campuses, for example, about the limits of free speech and about whether liberal academic freedoms have degenerated into a form of coercive political correctness. Beyond the academy itself, among the general public, academic freedom is contested ground. As Robert Post of Yale Law School has put it, academic freedom is "e;the price the public must pay in return for the social good of advancing knowledge."e; Populist currents of political opinion are questioning the price a society pays for the freedom of its 'experts' and professors.

Michael Ignatieff draws on his extensive experience as a writer and commentator on world affairs to present a penetrating account of the successes, failures, and prospects of the human rights revolution. Since the United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, this revolution has brought the world moral progress and broken the nation-state's monopoly on the conduct of international affairs. But it has also faced challenges. Ignatieff argues that human rights activists have rightly drawn criticism from Asia, the Islamic world, and within the West itself for being overambitious and unwilling to accept limits. It is now time, he writes, for activists to embrace a more modest agenda and to reestablish the balance between the rights of states and the rights of citizens. Ignatieff begins by examining the politics of human rights, assessing when it is appropriate to use the fact of human rights abuse to justify intervention in other countries. He then explores the ideas that underpin human rights, warning that human rights must not become an idolatry. In the spirit of Isaiah Berlin, he argues that human rights can command universal assent only if they are designed to protect and enhance the capacity of individuals to lead the lives they wish. By embracing this approach and recognizing that state sovereignty is the best guarantee against chaos, Ignatieff concludes, Western nations will have a better chance of extending the real progress of the past fifty years. Throughout, Ignatieff balances idealism with a sure sense of practical reality earned from his years of travel in zones of war and political turmoil around the globe. Based on the Tanner Lectures that Ignatieff delivered at Princeton University's Center for Human Values in 2000, the book includes two chapters by Ignatieff, an introduction by Amy Gutmann, comments by four leading scholars--K. Anthony Appiah, David A. Hollinger, Thomas W. Laqueur, and Diane F. Orentlicher--and a response by Ignatieff.

In the age of terrorism Michael Ignatieff argues that we must not shrink from the use of violence. But its use - in a liberal democracy - must be measured.