ABSTRACT
Of the six main protagonists of this book, without any doubt Franz Borkenau is the least known. Weber and Foucault are representative thinkers of their age, Elias and Voegelin are major figures in their field and have developed a considerable following, while Mumford is also a widely known public, academic and even literary figure. Borkenau, however, is only known as having written some classic works in the obscure and mostly forgotten field of communist studies, and as a peripheral figure of the early Frankfurt School, deserving perhaps a few footnotes.
