ABSTRACT
The intellectuals of the two nation-empires, the Soviet Union and the United States, are both, though in a very different way, caught up in a system which is identified with the State. Neither counter-ideology nor counter-State offers itself as an alternative. The 'American way of life' is the negation of what the European intellectual means by the word ideology. In countries which are protected from unanimity by their weakness and their internal divisions, the intellectuals are just as concerned for the efficacy as for the equity of their resolutions. The intellectual who sets some store by the just and reasonable organisation of society will not be content to stand on the side-lines, to put his signature at the bottom of every manifesto against every injustice. The intellectual-militant has given his allegiance to a few men, yesterday the revered leaders, tomorrow the masters of the bureaucracy.
