Of all my writings "Passion" (Free Press, 1984) is the one that lies closest to my heart and that most fully reveals the inner core of my ideas. In it I develop a view and an ideal of personality. This view and this ideal form a counterpart to the conception of society presented in my Politics books. The ideas about the self are neither more nor less fundamental than the ideas about politics. Despite the difference in genre, style, and length, the two sets of ideas represent two sides of the same doctrine

The introduction and the main body of the work differ in character. The main body presents a continuous, sustained argument about personality, uninterrupted by any attempt to relate this argument to different intellectual traditions. The introduction offers an account both of the nature of the claims advanced in the book and of the relation of these claims to the most influential families of beliefs about how we should live. Some readers, repelled by what may seem an archaic and groundless philosophy of human nature, should begin with the introduction. Other readers, unattracted to discourses about discourses, should read the main text first, and return to the introduction later.

• The Complete Text (300 pages)

Click Here For Full Text

These occasional pieces represent yet another attempt to reconsider general ideas about society and personality from the vantage point of a particular practical domain. The little lecture "The Better Futures of Architectures" was part of a debate with Jacques Derrida. The subsequent letter grew out of conversations, prompted by the lecture, with Rem Koolhaass and Frank Gehry.

• The Better Futures of Architecture (7 pages)
• The Present of Architecture and the Future of Democracy (9 pages, 1995)