Reconstructing America (Signed First Edition)

For too many people, America has become the primary symbol of all that is grotesque, deadening, and oppressive. It is time, says Ceaser in this provocative book, to take America back, to reaffirm confidence in our principles, and to remind ourselves that the real America-as opposed to the symbolic one-has forged a system of liberal democratic government that has shaped the destiny of the modern world.

Ceaser (government and foreign affairs, Univ. of Virgina) distinguishes between the "metaphysical or symbolic" America (the notion of America as a materialistic, decadent country) and the "real" America (America as a preeminent bastion of freedom and opportunity). The negative concept, he argues, originated in Europe?primarily in Germany and France. To flesh out this idea, he traces the thought of pertinent Germans from Hegel to Heidegger ("with passages through Spengler and Junger") and the French from Buffon to Bandrillard ("with passages through Maistre and Kojeve"). An engagingly written excursion through American and European political and intellectual history. this book touches on an important issue in contemporary American society: not only how other countries see America but the negative attitudes prevalent among certain groups, including academics here at home. In view of the climate of opinion surrounding Waco and Oklahoma City, this book's positive appraisal, written in a style accessible to the lay reader, could be of interest to a wide readership.?Leon H. Brody, U.S. Office of Personnel Mgt. Lib., Washingon, D.C.
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