Gray/Demos/Polanyi

[Jacob Segal]

John Gray is a English political philosopher, quite conservative, a
follower in some ways of Michael Oakeshott, probably the most  important
political thinker in England in the postwar era.  Gray's  theoretical work
is aimed at "liberal universalism" in the sense that he critizes the
pretensions of the liberal belief that certain rights are inhernet in being
human. Like Oakeshott, he is interested in traditions and practices and no
doubt critizes  market imperalism on those grounds. I imagine his critique
of globalism has to do with the creation of a universal or Americanized
world society.  I saw him give a talk once where he critized quite harshly
John Rawls for developing a universal grounding of justice; Gray called it
elitist and based on a east coast sensibility.  Gray has written recently
collections of essays on liberalism

Jacob Segal


>A copy of John Gray's False Dawn, just published by the New Press, arrived
>in the mail today. Does anyone know the rap on him? He seems a slightly
>higher brow version of Soros (whom he quotes, thanks, and is blurbed by),
>with vague calls for restraints on The Market, more enamored of "culture"
>and "place" and "tradition" and "indigenous values" than Soros, very
>anti-Marxist (part of the whole Enlightenment delusion), full of references
>to Demos and the Social Market Foundation and Polanyi. I'm beginning to
>worry that this Polanyi thing has gone too far. Can anyone fill me in on
>all this?
>
>Doug