Abstract

Peter Ludz was a divided man in a divided world and the search for an understanding and reconciliation of those divisions gave both structure and meaning to his life and work. He was, in a sense that perhaps only a German could be, a representative post-war intellectual. Nazism had destroyed the old Germany. Communism had divided the new Germany. Moreover, even though these ideologies pursued to their logical conclusions would spell the end of politics, they nevertheless embodied specific political theories and practices that had far-reaching consequences for the structure of economy and society and the role of ideas and intellectuals.