HIST 121 Lecture Notes - The Savage Mind, Prison Reform, Sayyid Qutb
Document Summary
Enlightenment globalized: enlightenment has triumphed globally, acknowledged by the whole world, universally accepted principles, culmination of modern western history, collective ideologies have faded, individual pursuit of reason, self-interest, wealth. Earlier forms held grave defects; liberal democracy free from fundamental, internal contradictions. Ideal of liberal democracy cannot be improved on. Critiquing west from religious perspectives not doing so based on ancient texts of religious literature; they have read western literature and philosophies. Rejected western liberal tradition not simply in the name of religious philosophy but in the name of a harmonious alternative. Need to cherish and preserve what is unique about each culture. Challenges globalization; modify individualistic aspects of the liberal project; culture, tradition, belonging. Competing ideologies: sayyid qutb, social justice in islam, 1950. Post-modernism arises out of nietzsche and the existentialist tradition. Roots: anti-liberal and existentialist: relativism, no valid universal truths, marxism and liberalism both progeny of the enlightenment.
