A critical study of the political ideas of philosopher Richard Rorty. Accepting Rorty’s conceptual vocabulary for the sake of argument, the author compares Rorty's social and political views with his alleged progenitor, John Dewey, showing that there are significant differences between the two, notably their respective conceptions of freedom and democracy and their accounts of how to harmonize personal freedom with public responsibility. Then Melkonian makes the case that the existing liberal democracies Rorty wants to defend bear little resemblance to the pragmatist philosopher’s own liberal utopia, in which "the quest for autonomy is impeded as little as possible by social institutions.”

Melkonian argues that at the end of the American century, Rorty's private role as ironist and his public role as apologist for existing liberal democracies are not so much incommensurable in principle as they are incompatible in fact. Rorty is caught in a bind: at the end of the American Century, defenders of liberal democracy in the public sphere undermine their role as ironists in the private sphere.