IT WAS ONLY WHEN I CAME TO REFLECT ON WHAT I MIGHT write that I realised the folly of my acceptance. The shock of the exercise, indeed, was that I could make no list of developments in political science to trigger off this article; clearly, no thoughts on the important books of the past generation were stored at the back of my mind, awaiting this invitation for their release. Having little to say, and most of that negative, all I can offer is some fragments of an intellectual autobiography.