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The Liberal Dilemma

Book review written by Oivind@nytid.no
ORIENTERING OCTOBER 1968: Hans Skjervheim's new book The Liberal Dilemma and other essays deserves a certain prevalence for obvious political reasons. Some will receive it with insults, accompany it with choirs, and bury it with a parable or a political sketch. Others will declare it well-known, label it as past, passé and thus confirm its criticism. Some will think that it is precisely for this reason that it is a very useful book, writes Øyvind Østerud in his review, among other things.

Hans Skjervheim:
"The Liberal Dilemma and Other Essays"
The "Idea and Thought" series
Basic Tanum Publisher 1968

Hans Skjervheim is hardly canonized in orthodox SUF circles on the basis of his newly published essay collection The Liberal Dilemma. That in itself is not a sufficient recommendation, but given the limitations of the authorized Marxist-Leninist diet, it is a good starting point.

Several of the articles in the book have been printed – and partly debated – in the past; two of them are based on lectures in the Norwegian Student Society. There followed a slightly confused debate when Skjervheim characterized current currents as "revolutionary romance", and his role as the left wing's own self-criticism was endangered when he supplied a coveted bourgeois press with the term. . .

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Oivind@nytid.no
Østerud is a professor of political science at the University of Oslo.

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