This wide-ranging investigation explores the influence of thinkers from diverse intellectual backgrounds on the development of twentieth century culture, and in so doing tells us much about the modern world in which we live.

Chapter 1 The century of the intellectual, Jeremy Jennings, Tony Kemp-Welch; Part 1 Insiders and outsiders; Chapter 2 The intellectual as social critic, Richard Bellamy; Chapter 3 Between autonomy and responsibility, Alan Scott; Chapter 4 Of treason, blindness and silence, Jeremy Jennings; Part 2 Priestly interventions; Chapter 5 Algeria and the dual image of the intellectual, Lahouari Addi; Chapter 6 Between the word and the land, Shlomo Sand; Chapter 7 A product of history, not a cause?, D. George Boyce; Part 3 Slavonic jesters; Chapter 8 Revolutionaries and dissidents, Edward Acton; Chapter 9 Politics and the Polish intellectuals, 1945-89, Tony Kemp-Welch; Chapter 10 Intellectuals and socialism, Neil Harding; Part 4 American agnostics; Chapter 11 Freedom, commitment and Marxism, Steven Biel; Chapter 12 The tragic predicament, George Cotkin; Chapter 13 Are intellectuals a dying species?, David L. Schalk; epilogue Epilogue; Chapter 14 'What truth? For whom and where?', Martin Hollis;

Jeremy Jennings is Reader in Political Theory at the University of Birmingham.,
Anthony Kemp-Welch is the Dean of the School of Economic and Social Studies at the University of East Anglia.