At least the 80's were good for something - this is written with real fervor, with the kind of intellectual panache that is all the greater for seeming to have been ignored. Neumann's work in this slim volume needs to be read by every would-be leftist, and then worried about over morning coffee. Social theory as "useless" - enduring brilliance that needs no updating, since western political culture seems frozen since the Neumann-derided sixties. Of course, no one is going to pay 45.00 for a 1988 paperback, so this review is self-congratulation, though the good professor deserved the Left Nobel for this youthful work.