Philosophers have always enjoyed asking awkward and provocative questions, such as: What is the nature of reality? What are human beings really like? This book is a comprehensive graphic guide to the thinking of various philosophers of the Western world from Heraclitus to Derrida. It examines and explains their key arguments and ideas.

What exactly is postmodernism? This graphic guide explains the maddeningly enigmatic concept that has been used to define the world's cultural condition.

Addresses such questions as: What is the place of individual choice and consequence in a post-Holocaust world of continuing genocidal ethnic cleansing? Is identity now a last-ditch cultural defence of ethnic nationalisms and competing fundamentalisms? And how do we define rights , self-interest and civic duties?

Forming his economic theories in the wake of the Great Depression, John Maynard Keynes argued that a healthy economy depended on the total spending of consumers, business investors and, most importantly, governments too. This graphic guide presents an introduction to one of the most influential economists of the 20th century.

This guide to the American political system shows how the country's institutions, history and practice affect government policies. It explains the balance between the two national parties and the way their rivalry is shaping up for the new century.

Modernism is usually understood as a radical aesthetic transformation, a shock wave of innovations in art, architecture, music and literature. This book explores the avantgardist work of Picasso, Joyce, Schoenberg and other modern masters, it assesses the cinema, but also delves deeper.

Rene Descartes is the father of modern philosophy. Famously, he is the philosopher who was prepared to doubt everything - even his own physical existence. 'Introducing Descartes' is a clear and accessible guide to all the puzzling questions he asked about human beings and their place in the world.