Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book focuses on intellectual engagement in the public sphere is threefold. It looks at particular complex social and political configurations in which intellectuals situated themselves, taking on positions or defending values, with all the contradictions, dilemmas and risks that engagement entails. The book addresses some of the complex issues about which public intellectuals often get passionately exercised. William Outhwaite looks at how public intellectuals have shaped and responded to civil society debates. Between 1917 and 1989, many of the debates among intellectuals were indeed debates about the pros and cons of communism. This unintentionally brought the social democratic left into accord with Western democracy, in some countries arguably quicker than in others. The majority of modern intellectuals across the Western world and in most of the developing countries have for some time now encountered and experienced some kind of counterpressure.