Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy

Download or read book Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy written by Grant N. Havers and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2013-10-15 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy critically interprets Strauss's political philosophy from a conservative perspective. Most mainstream readers of Strauss have either condemned him from the Left as an extreme right-wing opponent of liberal democracy or celebrated him from the Right as a traditional defender of Western civilization. Rejecting both portrayals, Grant N. Havers shifts the debate beyond the conventional parameters stating that Strauss was neither a man of the Far Right nor a conservative but. in fact a secular Cold War liberal. In Leo Strauss and Anglo-American Democracy Havers contends that the most troubling implication of Straussianism is that it provides an ideological rationale for the aggressive spread of democratic values on a global basis while ignoring the preconditions that make these values possible. Concepts such as the rule of law, constitutional government, Christian morality, and the separation of church and state are not easily transplanted beyond the historic confines of Anglo-American civilization, as recent wars to spread democracy have demonstrated.