Page "Counter-Enlightenment" Paragraph 17

Michel Foucault, for example, argued that attitudes towards the " insane " during the late-18th and early 19th centuries show that supposedly enlightened notions of humane treatment were not universally adhered to, but instead, that the Age of Reason had to construct an image of " Unreason " against which to take an opposing stand.

Berlin himself, although no postmodernist, argues that the Enlightenment's legacy in the 20th century has been monism ( which he claims favours political authoritarianism ), whereas the legacy of the Counter-Enlightenment has been pluralism ( something he associates with liberalism ).

These are two of the ' strange reversals ' of modern intellectual history.