Abstract

Over the past fifteen years many of those wandering aimlessly in the intellectual desert of Anglo-American jurisprudence have been guided toward the political mirage of “total criticism” by the Brazilian-American legal scholar, Roberto Mangabeira Unger. Both in person and in his writing Unger reveals a carefully crafted charismatic presence, combining the intellectual power and revivalistic enthusiasm of a latter-day Jonathan Edwards. Once established at Harvard Law School, hub of the academic legal universe, Unger was able to make a decisive intellectual contribution by committing his unconventional blend of radical rhetoric and evangelical passion to the emergence of the Critical Legal Studies movement.