Since here I pose as a theoretical diagnostician, I will read these essays symptomatically. The reverence accorded relevance in them is pervasive. Roger Masters is even bolder. I would hope that either conclusion would be resisted. If bolstered by the faith that Rousseau is indeed relevant today, inevitably the truth sought will be found.
Faith enables such success.
Despite her strict interpretive strictures on respect for the authentic authorial voice, Morgenstern similarly appropriates Rousseau. Rousseau is understood as speaking directly to twentieth-century concerns. I assume Morgenstern understands herself to be agendaless because she works on behalf of humanity. It would seem that an instrumental ethic has surfaced demanding that great figures from the history of political thought function as standing reserve for contemporary political thinking. Theory then becomes dependent on and subservient to forces and pressures other than those it imposes on itself via its own multivocal ethos.