A Hundred Encounters

Author: Sham LalPublisher: RupaYear: 2001Language: EnglishPages: 535ISBN/UPC (if available): 8171676057 DescriptionThis collection of a hundred book reviews, from Sham Lal's well-known literary column 'Life and Letters', gives a vivid idea of how leading social scientists diagnose the ills of modernity. While going into the reasons which led to the collapse of all communist regimes, representing one side of the modernity project, it also explains why the triumphalism of liberalism, standing for the other side, will have a false ring so long as most poor societies are ruled by despots of various stripes and face insuperable difficulties in making even a moderately successful transition to a market economy.The book discusses not only the pathologies of globalism and consumerism but also of the network society which is creating a new class of Pariah states. It also analyses the nature of the changes under way which are injecting contemporary thought with a new virus of nihilism which dis