Robin D. G. Kelley in the Boston Review:
Fourteen years ago, Noam Chomsky published “The Responsibility of Intellectuals, Redux” in these pages. He used the occasion of the tenth anniversary of 9/11 to revisit his classic 1967 essay on the subject, although the immediate occasion for the piece was the assassination of Osama bin Laden by U.S. Navy Seals. As the Obama administration (and much of America) celebrated, Chomsky exposed the operation as a violation of U.S. and international law. The singular goal was to kill bin Laden, not capture him and bring him to trial. There was no pretense of habeas corpus since his body was summarily dumped into the sea.
Chomsky thus reiterates his original contention that it is the “responsibility of intellectuals” to tell the truth about war—in this instance, the war on terror and the crimes of U.S. imperialism in the Middle East, Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Referring to decades of debate on the phrase, he notes, “The phrase is ambiguous: does it refer to intellectuals’ moral responsibility as decent human beings in a position to use their privilege and status to advance the causes of freedom, justice, mercy, peace, and other such sentimental concerns? Or does it refer to the role they are expected to play, serving, not derogating, leadership and established institutions?” His answer was clear: intellectuals must be guided by conscience and refuse to be beholden to state interests, either out of political loyalty or ideological commitment or both.
More here.
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