From the perspective of the Romans, Kennedy's Profiles begins to appear not as a series of unrelated anecdotes but as an argument about the nature of politics. The problem of contemporary politics, Profiles seems to suggest, is that both the citizens and political leaders have come to understand it in terms of procedure, self interest, ambition, bureaucracy, and groups. Kennedy writes:

Our political life is becoming so expensive, so mechanized and so dominated by professional politicians and public relations men that the idealist who dreams of independent statesmanship is rudely awakened by the necessities of election and accomplishment.

The danger is that what lies at the heart of politics—human action—becomes devalued, if not completely lost, in a political system that has become mechanized and institutionalized. Profiles, thus, appears as a response to this institutionalization, both through its "profiles," which place individuals at the center of...