نحو يوتوبيا ذكية

The author of The Sealed Envelope Toward an Intelligent Utopia (https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300282399/the-sealed-envelope/) argues for the necessity of cultural critics and intellectuals of American democracy. This insightful collection of essays analyzes the moral imagination of modernity and our intellectual and political legacy. George Scialappa presents a series of portraits and discussions with American and European thinkers from the last century, from conservatives such as John Gray, William Buckley, and Jonathan Haidt, to radicals such as Dwight MacDonald, Christopher Hitchens, and Bill McKibben. In our age in which democracy is under siege, and in which intellectual labor is looked down upon as the preserve of “elites,” Scialappa defends thinkers such as Richard Rorty, Barbara Ehrenreich, and Christopher Lasch, emphasizing a democratic political culture and their belief in the capacities of common people and the importance of intellectual labor. This collection bequeaths these values ​​“in a sealed envelope,” as Rilke says of love between selfish lovers, for future generations to use in crafting their own “intelligent utopia.”