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The Curious Enlightenement of Professor Caritat: A Novel

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It's a fictional critical comments on major schoold of political philosophies in the West at the end of the second millennium AD from the stand point of good, old Enlightenment. I fell in love with it with my first reading, have translated and published it in Thai last year, and used it to teach my political philosophy courses with great success and general enjoyment of the students. I learn more with each time that I reread it for my classes. Strongly recommended for anyone bored with theory and philosophy. It will change your intellectual life !

Any people can read this exciting book-- with or without interest in philosophy. Steven Lukes has the talent to make the readers feel the wonders of imagination, to escape the reality for awhile. At the same time, Lukes makes the readers learn the reality of the different societies we live in. The book is filled with ideas that let us judge whether a perfect world really exists or not.

I'm very happy to have read this book and probably will again. It's humorous, critical, reflective and gives a very entertaining perspective on Utopian Philosophies and what they value. I'd reccomend it to almost anyone interested in political theory and philosophy that enjoys a good satire.

As a sociology major, and having to read 24 other books this past semester, I was blown away at this novel. Lukes did such an excellent job at capturing the spirit of the enlightenment with Caritat's character. As Nicholas searched for the perfect society the reader struggles with him, hoping to find a perfect place. While the ending is a little predictable, I could never bear to put it down, and was so delighted to experience Professor Caritat's journey towards finding the perfect society!

A moderately interesting modern version of Voltaire's Candide. Lukes' hero, Professor Caritat (a reference to the philosophe Condorcet) is a scholar specializing in the Enlightenment, and is taken through of a tour of several societies. Each of these societies exemplifies an idea about how to construct a society. Authoritarianism, Utilitarianism, Communitarianism, and Libertarianism are all featured. There is a dream sequence with a Marxian utopia. All of these societies are shown to be inhumane in different ways, primarily because of a single-minded focus on one idea for constructing a society. The book ends essentially with an endorsement of moral pluralism and Rawlsian liberalism. The quality of writing is average with a fair number of perhaps excessively cute intellectual jokes. Moderately entertaining.

Professor Caritat (named after the surname of the Optimistic philosopher better known to us as the Marquis de Condorcet), a specialist on the thinkers of the Enlightenment, is a cross between a sophisticated Candide and a Gulliver. He is a citizen of Militaria, a repressive state run by a military dictatorship. He has to flee from that and embarks on a mission to find a state in which the ideas of 18th century philosophers have been applied and to see how these ideas have turned out in practice. He is looking for the best of all possible states. But in each of these countries he gets into trouble, wittily described, and has to move on.

The first country he visits is Utilitaria, which is governed by the ideas of Jeremy Bentham; and a soulless place it is, where there is no place for anything that cannot be proved to be `useful' to its society.

The next country is Communitaria. Its government is committed to total respect and equal treatment for every ethnic and every religious community, but it interprets respect in such a way that any comment which might suggest that one way of living or one set of ideas is superior to another, and every criticism of any group, is severely punished, so it is in effect an extremely intolerant state.

From there Caritat escapes to Proletaria - named, he is told, after the class that had brought it into being, although that class, like all others, has since withered away, as indeed has the state itself.

This turns out to be a phantasmagoria, from which he awakes to find himself in yet another country, Libertaria. Here free enterprise is rampant, every public service is in the process of being privatized, financial extortion is the name of the game, and woe betide those who can't play it. The country seems to be an ally of Militaria: though Libertarian `freedom' is missing there, Militaria's maintenance of `order' is something the Libertarians admire.

Finally, on his way out of that country, the Professor makes it to Minerva, a border town in the North of Libertaria. There he comes to the wise conclusion that what was the matter with all the dystopian states he had visited was that the single-minded pursuit of just one desirable aim (Order, Welfare, Respect, Equality, Freedom of Action) leads to the suppression of all the others. Condorcet had observed that all human ideals are linked together in an indissoluble chain. More practically, Isaiah Berlin (whom Lukes does not name in the text, though he does mention him in the bibliography) has taught that there needs to be a trade-off between all these desirable aims. How to strike this balance must be a never-ending quest, requiring much Wisdom.

One of his interlocutors in Libertaria had told him that people once believed that there was a state called Egalitaria north of their country, but that they had found that it did not exist and was in fact a utopia. Perhaps that is the reason why the book ends in Minerva, with Caritat seeing that just beyond the border is a crossroads from which several roads extended.

The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat by Stephen Lukes is an interesting book. It is about a professor's journey to find the best possible world. Professor Caritat, the main character escapes from a military run government called Millitaria. He explores different worlds based on different societies that have been deemed idealistic. Of which include Utilitaira, Bigotaria, Communitaria, and Libertaria. Through The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat, Stephen Lukes explores how various societies would have worked out in life. He explores their ups and downs. There is clearly a great amount of thought and effort that was required to write The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat. The societies he essentially tests in his novel are very thoroughly examined and studied in a relatively short amount of time that the Professor spends there.

The plot and story line could have been better. It feels like the plot is an excuse or mask for a way to explore civilizations without boring the reader. Although there is a driving force and a clever way for the professor to move to different locations, some of the debates of certain topics are dry. The debates in the book between various characters aren't very strongly worded or particularly good arguments. Although some are better then others, most of the debates don't seem to be well thought out.

The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat is definitely a good book to examine different society structures and views on life. Different societies can be used as different ways to examine life choices. For example, Utillitaria is a society based on maximizing production. This can translate into a life philosophy of the benefit out ways the cost. When the benefit of something out ways the cost of it then it is something you should do. In Utilitaria, the society is based on the idea that things should only be done if the overall impact is better then the overall cost. This may mean exiling someone because they consume more then they can produce in labor. This could also mean not letting people immigrate based on their background. Lukes also explores societies where people live in communes based on religion and ethnicity, communistic societies, and more. He does a very good job exploring the flaws of these so called perfect societies.

The book is a fairly easy read and masterfully coveys its messages. However, in order to see the message, you have to sit back and think about what the society really represents. Its easy just to read the book and think that it was a nice little book where a professor tried to find the best possible world he could. The hard part is to really understand the societies discussed within the book and how they impact life.

Overall, The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat is a fairly good read. It is definitely good for exploring societies and reflecting on what kind of world you live in. It is a good thought provoker if you think beyond the text. Otherwise, it's a story with a decent plot about a professor who runs around escaping societies.

For my honors book I chose to read The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Cartiat, by Steven Lukes. I only read half of this book, but from what I read it was a pretty difficult read. Some of the ideas and issues are very difficult to understand. I really only read one of the governments, but the one I read was all about an Ulitarian government. This government would work, except the people don't have much of an opinion. In this section there is a father and a son. The son thinks that the people should have a say on whether abortion is legal, and the father shouldn't. I agree much more with the son. His argument to support his point also stood out to me the most.

I think this book offered some great insights on what a real government should be. I think the main focus of the humor, was almost making fun of the government's ignorance. For example, in the book some Terrorists take Professor Cartiat, and hold him for ransom. He writes a number of letters, but the government says that they don't want to get involved. It is more of a witty humor then a joke humor.

If I had more time, I would have read this entire book, however I had a deadline. For anyone who is interested in politics and the way governments work, I recommend this book. However, I would not recommend it to children under 16 or 17. I wouldn't recommend it, because some parts are hard to understand, and the book gets very boring if you are confused and don't know what's happening.

The next place that Cartiat travels to in the book is Communitaria. This government is supposed to be like a communist government. However, I don't think an entirely communist government is possible. I think unlike the previous government where the people didn't have enough say, he is going to say that with this government people have to much say, and nothing gets resolved. Something is going to happen where they have to investigate a murder case, and they will never come to a decision of whether the client is guilty or not. I honestly have no clue what government he might travel to next, if the communist society isn't perfect. After all, he has to find the perfect government for his society to abide by.

I would rate this book 3 ½ out of 5 stars. I would rate it more, but parts of it got very dull and boring, while parts of it were exciting and interesting. I probably would have enjoyed it more if I had read it in about year, because like I said before, it is an advanced reading. Compared to my first honors book I read called; Nisa, I would have to say I enjoyed Nisa more. Not only was it an easier read, but it also had some interesting facts that I had never known before reading it. Despite all this, it was an excellent book to assign for a World Civilizations book, because it offers many insights on governments, and philosophers.

I've read some bad books, but wow, this is truly awful. Its only insightful moment, (which is also its only mildly comical moment) is when Caritat realizes that his experience in a Communist utopia had only been a dream. The rest of the book consists of maddeningly dumbed down caricatures of various political ideologies, written in the most ham-fisted, self-conscious, inconsistent prose I've ever had the misfortune of being required to read. A real letdown. A better use of your time might be to watch two orangutans pick chiggers out of each other's fur.

while the book was interesting. i found it very hard to read, very slow. i was extremely bored with the book and found it very hard to read.