Liberty and Civilization: The Western Heritage »

Roger Scruton is a writer and philosopher, currently an adjunct scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, and a Fellow of Blackfriars Hall, Oxford. He is the author of over thirty books, which have been widely translated, and a regular writer in the press in both Europe and the United States. His most recent books are Beauty (Oxford University Press) and Culture Counts (Encounter Books). He divides his time between rural Wiltshire and rural Virginia, in both of which places he lives with his wife and two small children.

An essential volume of essays commissioned by the American Spectator and edited by the philosopher Roger Scruton, Liberty and Civilization examines the intellectual and spiritual traditions of our belief in individual liberty, from its Judeo Christian origins on through Enlightenment philosophy. As we are confronted by belligerent atheism at home and jihadist Islam abroad, Liberty and Civilization is an invaluable tool for understanding why it is critical that we defend the cultural, religious, and intellectual institutions that have made our civilization great.

As one would expect from the American Spectator, the responses are both fiery and edifying, representing a broad swath of American conservative thought. The essayists include Paul Johnson, Anne Applebaum, Robert Bork, Robert P. George, Christina Hoff Sommers, and Roger Scruton.