Princeton Radicals is part history and part biography. It begins with a description of the issues that produced such passionate political activism in the 1960s and the specific campaigns that Students for a Democratic Society-the most important radical organization on campuses at the time-waged at Princeton University. The book then goes on to describe the lives of nine of the leaders of the Princeton campaigns, examining the effect of their participation in the radical movement on their choice of careers and subsequent political opinions.

A number of these former activists are still involved in efforts to create a more egalitarian society, the same goal that motivated them almost half a century ago. But even for those whose politics have changed dramatically, their career decisions have been informed by the same values that prompted their student activism.