Essays
Social Science
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Social science." Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Jul. 20, 1998.Abstract: Social science, any discipline or branch of science that deals with human behaviour in its social and cultural aspects. The social sciences include cultural (or social) anthropology, sociology, social psychology, political science, and economics.… More
Still Questioning
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Still Questioning." Intercollegiate Studies Institute-Education for Liberty. 1993.Abstract: In the retrospect of forty years I can see my book, The Quest for Community (first published by Oxford University Press in 1953; currently available from ICS Press, San Francisco), as one of the harbingers of what would become by the end of… More
The conservative renaissance in perspective
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The conservative renaissance in perspective." The Public Interest. 1985.Abstract: CONSERVATIVES might have been forgiven on election night, 1980, had visions of the millennium welled up in their minds. Ronald Reagan, 18-karat conservative of more than thirty years, former two-term governor, eloquent champion of Goldwater in 1964,… More
The Coercive Utopians, by Rael Jean Isaac and Erich Isaac
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The Coercive Utopians, by Rael Jean Isaac and Erich Isaac." Commentary Magazine. 1984.Abstract: Who are the coercive utopians? According to Rael Jean and Erich Isaac in this valuable book, they are the people in present-day America who hold the view that man is by nature both innocent and perfectible; that man’s innate decency is tormented… More
Slavery and Social Death, by Orlando Patterson
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Slavery and Social Death, by Orlando Patterson." Commentary Magazine. 1983.Abstract: Slavery, this book demonstrates, far from being a “peculiar institution,” comes very close to being, along with kinship and religion,… Read online on Commentary Magazine: Slavery and Social Death, by Orlando Patterson.
Eric Voegelins Vision 71
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Eric Voegelins Vision 71." The Public Interest. 1983.Abstract: EVER since his book, The New Science of Politics,was published in 1952, Erie Voegelin s reputation has been located among those thinkers we are prone to call “well known” but not “known well.” A formidable combination of scholarship and… More
Tocqueville Revisited
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Tocqueville revisited." The New Criterion 1, no 1. 1982: (76).Abstract: Richard Reeves American Journey: Travelling with Tocqueville in Search of Democracy in America. Simon & Schuster, 399 pages. It is a rare month when a newspaper column, article, or book doesn’t appear in which Alexis de Tocqueville is… More
The Quintessential Liberal
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The Quintessential Liberal." Commentary Magazine. 1981.Abstract: More than anyone else I can think of, including the late Hubert Humphrey, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., George McGovern, and James McGregor Burns, among others, John Kenneth Galbraith is the nearly perfect exemplar of American liberalism as we have come… More
MODERN AGE A QUARTERLY REVIEW: Conservatives and Libertarians: Uneasy Cousins
– Nisbet, Robert A. "MODERN AGE A QUARTERLY REVIEW: Conservatives and Libertarians: Uneasy Cousins." Isistatic. 1980.Abstract: BY COMMON ASSENT modern conservatism, as political philosophy, springs from Edmund Burke: chiefly from his Reflections on the Revolution in France, published in 1790. That book is of course more than a brilliantly prescient analysis of the… More
Knowledge and Decisions, by Thomas Sowell
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Knowledge and Decisions, by Thomas Sowell." Commentary Magazine. 1980.Abstract: During the past decade Thomas Sowell, who is professor of economics at UCLA, has made evident through a considerable range… Read online on Commentary Magazine: Knowledge and Decisions, by Thomas Sowell.
Many Tocquevilles
–NISBET, ROBERT. "Many Tocquevilles." The American Scholar 46, no. 1 (1977): 59-75.
Abstract: Many interest here is, in almost equal parts, Alexis de Tocqueville’s classic, Democracy in America, and the American intellectual scene, chiefly as we have known it since about 1940. Although some of Tocqueville’s major insights form… More
Public Opinion Versus Popular Opinion
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Public opinion versus popular opinion." The Public Interest. 1975.Abstract: OF all the heresies afloat in modern democracy, none is greater, more steeped in intellectual confusion, and potentially more destructive of proper governmental funetion than that which declares the legitimacy of government to be directly… More
The New Despotism
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The New Despotism." Commentary Magazine. 1975.Abstract: When the modern political community was being shaped at the end of the 18th century, it was thought by its founders that the consequences of republican or representative institutions in government would be the reduction of political power in… More
Was There an American Revolution?
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Was There an American Revolution?" The American Conservative. July 4, 2012.Abstract: Was there in fact an American Revolution at the end of the eighteenth century? By this, I mean a revolution involving sudden, decisive, and irreversible changes in social institutions, groups, and traditions, in addition to the war of liberation… More
The Pursuit of Equality
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The Pursuit of Equality." The Public Interest. 1974.Abstract: IT is evident that, barring major physical catastrophe, war, or some other massive cause of deflection of current social interests, the idea of equality will be sovereign for the rest of this century in just about all circles concerned with the… More
The Nemesis of Authority
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The Nemesis of Authority." Intercollegiate Studies Institute-Education for Liberty. 1972.Abstract: IN our day “authority” is not a popular word. We tend commonly to confuse it with power or coercion, and generally give it low ranking among the civil virtues. Not for a long time in the West has “authority” come close to… More
The Future of the University
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The Future of the University." Commentary Magazine. 1971.Abstract: No one surveying the academic scene today can conclude other than that the American university is in an exceedingly precarious position. The luster of even the most historic and distinguished of universities is fading. For the first time in the… More
The Counter-Culture and its Apologists:1 – An Epistle to the Americans
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The Counter-Culture and its Apologists:1 - An Epistle to the Americans." Commentary Magazine. 1970.Abstract: First, the politics of the matter. Is it possible to dislike Spiro T. Agnew and also dislike the Scranton Report?1 The answer is yes. Can one like Agnew and like the Report? Yes. Can one like Agnew and dislike the Report? Still yes. Finally, can one… More
The Grand Illusion: An Appreciation of Jacques
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The Grand Illusion: An Appreciation of Jacques." Commentary Magazine. 1970.Abstract: Jacques Ellul is a deeply respected lay theologian in the (Protestant) Reformed Church of France, and also professor of law and history at the University of Bordeaux. He was born in Bordeaux in 1912, attended first the University there, then the… More
The twilight of authority
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The twilight of authority." The Public Interest. 1969.Abstract: THE most striking fact in the present period of revolutionary change is the quickened erosion of the traditional institutional authorities that for nearly a millennium have been Western man’s principal sources of order and liberty. I am referring… More
Victorian Minds, by Gertrude Himmelfarb
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Victorian Minds, by Gertrude Himmelfarb." Commentary Magazine. 1968.Abstract: DOUBTLESS God could create a better interpreter of the English 19th century, but doubtless God hasn’t. So might the homely… Read online on Commentary Magazine: Victorian Minds, by Gertrude Himmelfarb.
The Year 2000 and All That
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The Year 2000 and All That." Commentary Magazine. 1968.Abstract: The approach of the year 2000 is certain to be attended by a greater fanfare of predictions, prophecies, surmises, and forewarnings than any millennial year in history. In the past twelve months, at least four books on this subject have appeared,… More
Crisis in the University?
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Crisis in the university?" The Public Interest. 1968.Abstract: Is there one? Quite a few intellectuals think so, but this in itself is not a sure guide. Intellectuals are often prone to see “crisis” in circumstances that for other persons merely range from good to bad, desirable to undesirable. In medicine,… More
Project Camelot: an Autopsy
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Project Camelot: an autopsy." National Affairs. 1966.Abstract: Project Camelot may well have been the worst single scientific project since King Canute dealt with the tides: the worst conceived, worst advised, worst designed, and worst executed. But this much has to be said for it. Never has one project in the… More
Notebooks, 1942-1951, by Albert Camus
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Notebooks, 1942-1951, by Albert Camus." Commentary Magazine. 1966.Abstract: The literary interest and philosophical importance of this, the second volume of Camus’s notebooks, are bound up with the period… Read online on Commentary Magazine: Notebooks, 1942-1951, by Albert Camus.
What is an Intellectual?
– Nisbet, Robert A. "What is an Intellectual?" Commentary Magazine. 1965.Abstract: The question of who or what is an intellectual may not be one that would have rocked the Mermaid Tavern or rattled the tables of 18th-century coffee houses, but in our self-conscious age it plainly has commanding importance. Used as a noun, the word… More
The Permanent Professors: a Modest Proposal
– Nisbet, Robert A. "The permanent professors: a modest proposal." The Public Interest. 1965.Abstract: Although tenure is widely regarded as essential to the idea of the university, I would like to suggest it is far from certain that such is the ease. Tenure differs sharply from academic freedom in this respect. A university worthy of the name is… More
Hutchins of Chicago
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Hutchins of Chicago." Commentary Magazine. 1964.Abstract: Though the public still hears from Robert M. Hutchins as head of the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions and perennial critic of the higher vocationalism of our colleges and universities, he is perhaps best known for his years at the… More
Europe and America, by Solomon F. Bloom
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Europe and America, by Solomon F. Bloom." Commentary Magazine. 1962.Abstract: “MODERN HISTORY,” Lord Acton wrote, “tells how the last four hundred years have modified the medieval conditions of life and… Read online on Commentary Magazine: Europe and America, by Solomon F. Bloom.
Foreign Policy & the American Mind
– Nisbet, Robert A. "Foreign Policy & the American Mind." Commentary Magazine. 1961.Abstract: Robert A. Nisbet here contributes the fourth in our series of re-appraisals—written from differing points of view—of the key problems that confront American foreign policy in the 60’s. It is only too clear that behind the tactical and… More
The Study of Man: Voting Practices Versus Democratic Theory
– Nisbet, Leonard A. "The Study of Man: Voting Practices versus Democratic Theory." Commentary Magazine. 1961.Abstract: The relation of man to state is a timeless problem, one that provides a sturdy bridge from Plato to the Michigan Survey on elections. But in our day, we tend to deal with this problem very differently from our more philosophically-minded forebears.… More
Class in American Society.
– Reissman, Leonard Commentary. "Class in American Society." Commentary Magazine. 1960.Abstract: A SKEPTICAL historian once suggested that feudalism was introduced into England, not by William the Conqueror in the 11th century… Read online on Commentary Magazine: Class in American Society.