Symposium: Part I: Public Intellectuals Then and Now

The French political thinker Raymond Aron (1905-1983) provides the imitable model of the political philosopher as civic educator. Writing in an age of extreme ideological polarization, he aimed at a truly balanced approach to historical and political understanding. In a series of writings from the late 1930's onward, Aron defended a principled middle way between Machiavellian cynicism and the "abstract moralism" so evident in the public engagement of modern intellectuals. Aron argued for the renewal of liberalism on the foundation of a broad-based "democratic conservatism" and displayed remarkable lucidity regarding the totalitarian temptation. This paper explores this distinctive notion of "democratic conservatism"--equally distant from revolutionary romanticism and reactionary nostalgia--that guided Aron's public engagement over a fifty-year period and that was central to his idea of the political responsibility of intellectuals.[PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]