This is a book which complains about poor writing in the social sciences. The author is not someone who is offering criticisms as an outsider looking in upon a strange world. I am an insider, a social scientist, and I am publicly criticizing my fellows for their ways of writing. Anyone who does this can expect to have their motives questioned. Readers may wonder whether the author is embittered, having seen younger colleagues overtake him in the race for academic honours. Perhaps he has been slighted in the past by senior figures and now he is determined upon gaining his revenge. Or possibly the author is deeply flawed as a person, a serial troublemaker, who is constantly picking quarrels and seeking to be the centre of attention.

So, I should begin with a few personal remarks. I am not a young scholar, rebelling against the establishment, but I am approaching the end of my working life, having spent almost forty years in continuous employment as a university teacher. It has, for the most part, been a wonderful job. Not only has the work been relatively well remunerated, but it has been a privilege to be paid for reading and writing; and it has not been a hardship to teach bright, young people, some of whom have even been interested in the topics that I have taught. I cannot imagine a better way to earn a salary; but that may say more about my lack of imagination than it does about working as a modern academic in the social sciences.