Introduction

Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. CONTENTS v
3. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS vii
4. Introduction 1
5. Part I. THE REVIVAL OF THE IDEA OF HISTORY AS A RATIONAL PROCESS
6. 1. On the Possibility of Writing A Universal History 13
7. 2. Hegel on History, Self-Determination, and the Absolute 30
8. Part II. RETROSPECTIVE: ON THE HISTORY OF THE IDEA OF HISTORY
9. 3. Machiavelli and the Idea of Progress 61
10. 4. Kant's Idea of History 75
11. 5. The End of History in the Open-ended Age? The Life Expectancy of Self-evident Truth 97
12. 6. Nietzsche and Spengler on Progress and Decline 117
13. Part III. CONTEMPORARY REFLECTIONS: WHERE IS HISTORY GOING?
14. 7. Political Conflict after the Cold War 137
15. 8. Enlightenment under Threat 155
16. 9. "What Then?": The Irrepressible Radicalism of Democracy 167
17. 10. Feminism and the Crisis of Contemporary Culture 196
18. 11. The End of Leninism and History as Comic Frame 211
19. 12. The Age of Limits 227
20. NOTES 241
21. NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS 263
22. INDEX 267