The Snake that Swallowed its Tail

Some Contradictions in Modern Liberalism

Mark Garnett

September 2004, 96 pages
ISBN 0 907845 886 (paperback), £8.95/$17.90

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essays in political and cultural criticism
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Table of contents    Introduction
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Liberal values are the hallmark of a civilised society. Yet they depend on an optimistic view of the human condition, Stripped of this essential ingredient, liberalism has become a hollowed-out abstraction. Tracing its effects through the media, politics and the public services, the author argues that hollowed-out liberalism has helped to produce our present discontent. Unless we stop boasting about our values and try to recover their essence, liberal society will be crushed in the coils of its own contradictions.

Mark Garnett teaches politics at Leicester University and is the co-author of The Essential A-Z Guide to Modern British History, Whatever Happened to the Tories, Keith Joseph: A Life and The Authorized Biography of Willie Whitelaw.
 

  • "Few academic writers know enough about the business of politics to be able to write intelligently about the tangled links between theory and practice. Garnett is one of the few, and his arresting and often amusing account of the political history of postwar Britain as a transition from fleshed-out to hollowed-out liberalism will be read with profit by anyone interested in the role of ideas in politics."  John Gray, New Statesman
  • "A clarion call to true liberals to wake up and stem the tide."  Commonwealth Lawyer
  • "A stimulating discussion of the nature of modern liberalism"  Network
  • "A brainless slab of Leftist bigotry"  Appraisal: The Journal of the Society for Post-Critical and Personalist Studies

    • Table of Contents

    Acknowledgements
    Introduction
    The Anatomy of a Snake
    The Media
    Politics
    The Public Services
    Bibliography

    Praise for previous books by Mark Garnett

    The A-Z Guide to Modern British History, by Mark Garnett and Richard Weight
    ‘200 snappy and stylish essays on the topics that dominated British life since 1900’, Boyd Tonkin, Independent
    Splendid! Splendid! The Authorized Biography of Willie Whitelaw by Mark Garnett and Ian Aitken
    ‘A vivid and sympathetic portrait’, Douglas Hurd, Daily Telegraph
    Keith Joseph: A Life by Andrew Denham and Mark Garnett
    ‘sets a new standard for political biography’, John Gray, New Statesman

     

     
     














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