After 1945, Britain wanted to be a new country. The authority of state and church were giving way, the Empire was dismantled, and it was no longer clear who was leading whom in matters of morals. Individuals were left to reinvent their ethical lives anew. The lives and works of the philosophers discussed in this book were caught up this sea-change. Bernard Williams, Philippa Foot, Iris Murdoch, Richard Wollheim, Charles Taylor and Alasdair MacIntyre were all characters in search of a moral England, with a particular vision of the good society. From communitarianism to swinging Sixties'' individualism, and radical theories of art - which understood questions of ambiguity, error and forgiveness more than the state ever could - this a story of their sometimes convergent but often discrepant ideas on ethical life in the second half of the twentieth century. Undoing the Moral Empire is a work of biography, social history and the history of ideas that masterfully reconstructs the shifting sentiments of the post-war era, reconfiguring enduringly relevant questions of virtue, freedom, society and community.

Autorentext
Lesley Chamberlain is an independent scholar and novelist who has been writing on Russian themes for over 40 years. She is the author of a number of critically acclaimed books, including Arc of Utopia: The Beautiful Story of the Russian Revolution (2017), Motherland: A Philosophical History of Russia (2004), and The Philosopher Steamer: Lenin and the Exile of the Intelligentsia (2006).

Klappentext

After 1945, Britain wanted to be a new country.

The authority of state and church were giving way, the Empire was dismantled, and it was no longer clear who was leading whom in matters of morals. Individuals were left to reinvent their ethical lives anew.

The lives and works of the philosophers discussed in this book were caught up this sea-change. Bernard Williams, Philippa Foot, Iris Murdoch, Richard Wollheim, Charles Taylor and Alasdair MacIntyre were all characters in search of a moral England, with a particular vision of the good society. From communitarianism to swinging Sixties' individualism, and radical theories of art - which understood questions of ambiguity, error and forgiveness more than the state ever could - this is the story of their sometimes convergent but often discrepant ideas on ethical life in the second half of the twentieth century.

Undoing the Moral Empire is a work of biography, social history and the history of ideas that masterfully reconstructs the shifting sentiments of the post-war era, reconfiguring enduringly relevant questions of freedom, virtue, and society.

Inhalt

1.Introduction
2.Bernard Williams
3.Philippa Foot

4. Richard Wollheim
   5.Alasdair MacIntyre
5. Iris Murdoch
6. Charles Taylor
7. Conclusion