Cloaked in Virtue

by Nicholas Xenos

It is now commonly acknowledged that numerous key players in and around the Bush administration’s planning of the Iraq invasion were connected through a common background in the political philosophy of Leo Strauss, a German-born University of Chicago professor who died in 1973. These Straussian "neocons" were held responsible for exploiting the September 11th attacks in order to further their own foreign policy agenda. Cloaked in Virtue is the first book to take a critical view of the political ideas of Leo Strauss himself by careful attention to his own writings before and after his emigration to the United States. The result is a critical examination of the political theory of Leo Strauss, lifting the veil of intentional obfuscation, and its influence on the neoconservative foreign policy of the George W. Bush administration. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of politics and international relations.

192 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 2007

Reviews

[Katy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thought that I might assign this book in a classical political thought class I'm teaching but I wouldn't recommend doing that; it illuminates far more about Strauss and the misinformation he has fed people than renewing my respect for the classics (e.g.--not that that was my goal)...I found the book hard to put down--it was really fascinating.....finally, I now question assigning the Prince (edited by Mansfield) because of the intentional misreadings of some Straussians (granted that Mansfield isn't discussed at any length in the book--on the other hand, one of my favorite people to criticize is--Fukuyama--and those parts are satisfying)...