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Raymond Aron (1905–1983)

Author of The Opium of the Intellectuals

126+ Works 2,438 Members 23 Reviews 3 Favorited

About the Author

Raymond Aron was a French political scientist, economist, and philosopher who was several times a visiting professor in the United States. He commented regularly and influentially on social and political topics and current issues in the conservative French newspaper Le Figaro, in books and on show more radio, and as a teacher at L'ecole pratique des hautes etudes, in Paris. Because of his consistent opposition to Marxism and his admiration and respect for the United States, Aron was perhaps not so highly regarded as French intellectuals of the Left. But he was always a voice for reason and moderation at a time when his critics were often strident and ineffectual. (Bowker Author Biography) show less

Series

Works by Raymond Aron

Memoirs (1983) — Author — 139 copies
An Essay on Freedom (1965) 77 copies
The Century of Total War (1954) 67 copies
On War (1958) 49 copies
German Sociology (1964) 28 copies
Marxismo de Marx, O (2002) 23 copies
Marxismes imaginaires (1970) 19 copies
Gli ultimi anni del secolo (1901) 17 copies
Liberty and Equality (2013) 16 copies
Politics and History (1978) 15 copies
Leçons sur l'histoire (1989) 15 copies
Britannica Perspectives (1968) 10 copies
Karl Marx (2015) 7 copies
Mémoires Tome 1 (1900) 6 copies
Mémoires Tome 2 (1983) 5 copies
France: The New Republic (1960) 4 copies
Diálogo (2007) — Author — 3 copies
Lezioni sulla storia (1997) 2 copies
Le XXe siècle (1999) 2 copies
Esej o svobodách (1992) 2 copies
Sosyolojik Dusuncenin Evreleri (2015) — Author — 2 copies
Opium intelektualistów (2000) 2 copies
Mitos e Homens 2 copies
Aron et De Gaulle (2022) 1 copy
La sociologie (1978) 1 copy
Political Theory (1979) 1 copy
Widz i uczestnik (1984) — Author — 1 copy
Kebebasan dan Martabat Manusia — Author — 1 copy
Der permanente Krieg (1953) 1 copy
Chroniques de guerre (1990) 1 copy

Associated Works

The Prince (1513) — Foreword, some editions — 23,516 copies
The Theory of the Leisure Class (1899) — Foreword, some editions — 2,255 copies
The Vocation Lectures (1948) — Introduction, some editions — 519 copies
The Philosophy of History in Our Time (1959) — Contributor — 217 copies
Propyläen-Weltgeschichte - Eine Universalgeschichte (1960) — Contributor, some editions — 63 copies
Propyläen-Weltgeschichte - Band 10: Die Welt von heute (1991) — Contributor — 20 copies
Israel attaque (1968) — Foreword, some editions — 5 copies

Tagged

16th century (264) classic (409) classic literature (70) classics (555) ebook (94) economics (278) essay (93) essays (73) ethics (105) fiction (228) goodreads (60) government (118) history (816) Italian (260) Italian literature (238) Italy (408) Kindle (97) Leadership (96) literature (258) Niccolo Machiavelli (244) non-fiction (1,248) own (86) paperback (60) philosophy (2,153) political (97) political philosophy (337) political science (563) political theory (352) politics (1,832) power (95) read (180) Renaissance (457) social science (74) sociology (488) strategy (102) theory (65) to-read (909) translation (78) unread (107) war (82)

Common Knowledge

Canonical name
Aron, Raymond
Legal name
Aron, Raymond-Claude-Ferdinand
Birthdate
1905-03-14
Date of death
1983-10-17
Burial location
Cimetière du Montparnasse, Paris, Île-de-France, France
Gender
male
Nationality
France (birth)
Country (for map)
France
Birthplace
Paris, France
Place of death
Paris, France
Cause of death
Crise cardiaque
Places of residence
Paris, France
Education
Ecole Normale Supérieure (Ph.D | 1938)
Institut d'études politiques de Paris
Lycée Hoche, Versailles, France
Lycée Condorcet
Occupations
philosopher
sociologist
political scientist
historian
journalist
memoirist
Relationships
Schnapper, Dominique (daughter)
Aron, Jean-Paul (nephew)
Karády, Viktor (assistant)
Castel, Robert (protégé)
Aron, Suzanne (wife)
Organizations
Collège de France (Professeur, Sociologie, 1970 | Professeur, Sociologie, 1970)
Université de la Sorbonne, Institut d'études politiques, Ecole pratique des Hautes études, Paris (Professeur, Sociologie, 1955 | 1967)
Le Figaro, Journal (Editorialiste, 1947 | 1977)
Combat, Journal (Editorialiste, 1946 | 1947)
Ecole Nationale d'Administration (Chargé de cours, Philosophie, 1946 | 1947)
Ministère de l'information, France 'Directeur du cabinet d'André Malraux, 1944 | 1946) (show all 19)
Les Temps Modernes, Revue (Contributeur actif, 1944 | 1945)
La France libre, Revue de résistance à Londres (Collaborateur actif et éditorialiste, 1940 | 1944)
Armée française, WW2 (Mobilisation, 1939 | 1940)
Centre de Documentation sociale de l'École normale, Paris (Secrétaire, 1935)
Lycée du Havre (Professeur, Philosophie, 1933 | 1934)
Institut français de Berlin (Pensionnaire | 1931 | 1933)
Université de Cologne (Lecteur, 1930 | 1931)
Fort de Saint-Cyr, Service militaire (1928 | 1930)
L'Express (Magazine | Editorialiste, Président du comité directeur, 1977 | 1983)
Société française de sociologie (Président, 1962 | 1964)
Institut français de sociologie (Membre, Président, 1961 | 1962)
Centre européen de sociologie historique (Directeur, 1969 | 1983)
Centre de sociologie européenne (Directeur, 1960 | 1968)
Awards and honors
Goethepreis der Stadt Frankfurt (1979)
Officier de la Légion d'honneur
Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur
Commandeur de l'ordre des Palmes académiques
Croix Pour le Mérite (version civile)
Foreign Honorary Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1960) (show all 13)
International member, American Philosophical Society (1966)
Prix des Ambassadeurs (1962)
Prix Montaigne (1968)
Prix des Critiques (1973)
Goethe Prize (1979)
Erasmus Prize (1983)
Croix de guerre 1939-1945
Short biography
Raymond Aron was born to a secular Jewish family in Paris, France. His father was a lawyer. After lycée, he studied at the École Normale Supérieure, from which he received a doctorate in the philosophy of history in 1930. He took first place in the civil service agrégation exam in philosophy in 1928. He took a lecturer position at the University of Cologne and focused on major German philosophers, sociologists, and political and military thinkers. Witnessing the rise to power of the Nazi regime and book burnings in Berlin in 1933 Aron presciently concluded that war was inevitable and returned to France. He married Suzanne Gauchon the same year. In 1935, he published his first book, La Sociologie allemande contemporaine (Contemporary German Sociology). He was a professor of social philosophy at the University of Toulouse when World War II broke out in 1939, and he volunteered for the French Air Force. After the fall of France to Nazi Germany, he went to London to join the Free French forces of General Charles de Gaulle in exile and edited their newspaper, La France Libre (Free France), from 1940 to 1944. On his return to Paris at the end of the war, Aron became a sociology professor at the École Nationale d'Administration. From 1955 to 1968, he was professor of sociology at the Sorbonne. From 1970, he was a professor at the Collège de France. Throughout his career. Aron also worked as a journalist, and in 1947 he became an influential columnist for Le Figaro, a position he held for 30 years. In 1977, he left Le Figaro and began to write a political column for the weekly magazine L'Express. Aron had a decisive influence on the political culture in France and in Europe. Through his writings, he gave force to anti-totalitarian liberalism and rationalist humanism, and was often contrasted with his great contemporary (and former classmate) Jean-Paul Sartre, an existentialist and Communist. Among Aron's most influential works were L'Opium des intellectuels (The Opium of the Intellectuals, 1955), La Tragédie algérienne (The Algerian Tragedy, 1957), and République impériale: Les États-Unis dans le monde, 1945–1972 (The Imperial Republic: The United States and the World, 1945–1973). A constant theme running through his writings was the subject of violence and war, as in Paix et guerre entre les nations (Peace and War: A Theory of International Relations, 1962) and his books on the Prussian military theorist Carl von Clausewitz. Aron also wrote an influential history of sociology entitled Les Étapes de la pensée sociologique (Main Currents in Sociological Thought, 1967). He published his Mémoires shortly before his death in 1983.

Members

Reviews

 
Flagged
luvucenanzo06 | Feb 19, 2024 |
I'm going to be straight forward: don't read this book if you don't have a particular interest in the history of ideas or intellectual history of the mid-20th century. Because this book is largely marked by the period in which it was written, around 1954-55, during the height of the Cold War. Raymond Aron (1905-1983) was still a rising French intellectual, did not yet have a permanent position at a university or a research institution, but had already made himself noticed in the polemic surrounding Marxism and more specifically Stalinism, especially because he undisguisedly opposed what he called the idolatry of extreme left-wing ideas. In this book he systematically explains his views on this. In other words, you must have some knowledge of Marxism itself, and especially of the French intellectual landscape of the 1950s. And – with my apologies – still 1 element that makes the reading difficult: the book is not as homogeneous as I expected, sometimes it looks more like a collection of previously published articles. (By the way: I read this in French, so I couldn’t comment on the translation)

Enough warnings. What I especially want to emphasize is how lucid Aron's analyzes were: how fearlessly he attacked all the sacred cows (in this case of the left), in an argument that razor sharply exposed the contradictions of Marxism and especially Stalinism and de facto proved how those views in reality were wrong. But there's more. Aron frames his judgment in a broader vision of the naive progressive optimism of the left, of exaggerated philosophies of history in Western culture, of the idolization of the phenomenon of 'revolution' in France, and of the own moral psychology of the intellectual elite. With regard to the latter, in my opinion he occasionally went a bit out of line, for example by scornfully pointing out that intellectuals are not insensitive to the 'pecuniary aspects' of the public forum.
I could write endless more about this book, but others have done it much better. I conclude by underlining that - although this book is very dated, especially in terms of context - it is nevertheless testimony to a lucid and brilliant mind, whose right has been confirmed by history.
In my History account on Goodreads I go into a little more detail about Aron's philosophy of history: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6046153633.
… (more)
 
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bookomaniac | 3 other reviews | Dec 13, 2023 |

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Statistics

Works
126
Also by
8
Members
2,438
Popularity
#10,524
Rating
½ 3.7
Reviews
23
ISBNs
300
Languages
14
Favorited
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