Modern political thought: the great issues

The wars and revolutions of our century have strongly revived the interest in political ideas. Conflicts between, and within, nations are over power and advantage; but they also express profound cleavages of ideas and creeds rooted in conflicting ways of life. If western civilization is to survive, we shall have to develop a deeper knowledge and keener appreciation of its basic values than ever before, because the threat confronting it-communist world domination-is more serious than ever before.
The most direct way of acquainting oneself with the great ideas that have animated the western world from Machiavelli to date is to go back to the great writers themselves. This is the method employed in the However, I have prefaced each chapter of selections from original sources with an introductory essay of my own to provide the proper setting and perspective for the issues dealt with. To further facilitate the work and pleasure of the reader, the Bibliographical Notes at the end of the book contain additional bibliographical comments and criticisms which, it is hoped, will help to convey the vitality and excitement of important political ideas as well as aid in research on more specialized topics.
As to the presentation of the material, it has seemed to me that the richness and complexity of modern political thought, particularly as it effects world events, may easily be lost in the customary chronological or biographical approach, and as a result I have adopted the method of great issues as the focus of attention and organization.
Part I, “Philosophy, Psychology, and Politics,” stresses, first, the fact that, in a broad sense, all questions of political philosophy are related to fundamental issues of general philosophy, and, secondly, that there can be no balanced understanding of group life without a penetrating grasp of the motivations, tensions, and anxieties of the individual. The contributions which philosophy and psychology can make to a better understanding of politics are immense, and our political wisdom will grow in proportion to our ability to draw on new sources of knowledge and insight.
Part II, “The Foundations of Democracy," seeks to explore democracy as a way of life rather than as a governmental system. Democracy is more than a set of institutions: it is the quality of the men and women who compose it that counts above all—and if that quality is unequal to the challenge, the hope for democratic survival will be dim.