This book explores the morality of pride, a value that has been condemned through history and is still largely unwelcome in many societies. The author explores the nature of the self and free will, and how pride links to technology and rational theology. It refers to the work of Lionel Trilling, Allan Bloom, Charles Taylor and Heidegger on authenticity; Jacob Burckhardt, Stephen Toulmin, Max Weber and Mark Lilla on modernity; Christine Korsgaard on the self; John Rawls and Ruth Benedict on morality; and the Stoics and Kant on free will.

I. PROPER PRIDE.- 1. Why pride? Theses.- 2.The meaning of the term pride.- 3. Pride and metaphysics.- 4. Augustine on due pride.- 5. Kierkegaard on due pride.- II. HISTORY AND ITS CHALLENGES.- 6. The Renaissance interest in doing things for their own sake.- 7. Intrinsic goals.- 8. Passion and professionalism.- 9. The bourgeois revolution and bourgeois authenticity.- 10. Rousseau's authenticity.- 11. Marx, Weber, and mere subjectivity.- 12. Heidegger's authenticity.- 13. Authenticity in contemporary discussion.- 14. Authenticity in China.- 15. Rethinking secularization, liberalism, and religion.- III. MORALITY AND THE SELF.- 16. What are morality and moral theory?.- 17. Shame and pride.- 18. Korsgaard and self-constituters vs. self-discoverers.- 19. Kant, free will and the self.- 20. Inheritance pride, authenticity, and morality.- IV. PROSPECTS OF PROPER PRIDE.- 21. Technology and society.- 22. Problems of the economy.- 23. Basic income.- 24. The shrinking of the nation states.- 25. Data processing and liberty.- 26. Data processing in novels.- 27. Competitors in metaphysics.- 28. Kitsch, tragedy, and power.- 29. Prospects, bleak and less bleak.- Instead of a conclusion.- Select Bibliography.- Index.