From the perspectives of postmodernism and post-Communism - central to discussion in this work - the butchery in former Yugoslavia is a special case because this violence is occurring in the heart of Europe, a continent which had promised never to tolerate such a bloodbath again. Consideration of rational solutions seems incapable of getting to grips with the problem. The author argues that the media have reduced the world audience to a collective voyeur passively watching, monitoring, and observing crimes against humanity in former Yugoslavia. The Balkan war has produced the Balkanization of...

The many dramatic events of the current fin de siecle - especially the fall of communism - raise anew some perennial questions concerning modernity and civilization. Are we living at the height of civilization or just through a latter day barbarism? Are modernists and postmodernists more barbaric than ever? And if so, how might this be resolved? The author examines a variety of approaches to questions of barbarism and civilization. He draws on Veblen's argument that barbarism is rooted in cultural habits that persist despite modernity. Upon this basis, an attack is launched against...