Quest for Civil Order

"In this study, four notable thinkers in the field of modern social and political theory are examined, with a view to determining how far it is possible to create and maintain a non-coercive but sustainable political order under conditions of diversity in contemporary Western societies." "The four writers considered are Ernest Gellner, whose thought focused on the concept of civil society; Friedrich Hayek, whose principal concern was with a market-centred spontaneous social order; Jurgen Habermas, whose ideal is a discursive democracy; and Michael Oakeshott, whose model of a free society is based on a non-instrumental conception of civil association."--Jacket.