Introduction -- Max Weber and the politics of the twentieth century -- Herbert Marcuse and the Frankfort School : the tyranny of instrumental reason -- Hannah Arendt : classical republicanism and the modern world -- C.B. Macpherson : possessive individualism and liberal democracy -- Michael Oakeshott : rationalism and civil association -- Friedrich Hayek : the theory of spontaneous order -- Karl Popper : critical rationalism and the open society -- Isaiah Berlin : monism and pluralism -- John Rawls : liberal justice -- Robert Nozick : the minimal state -- Jürgen Habermas : discourse ethics and democracy -- Conclusion : the end of history?