Robert A. Heinlein is an outstanding figure in modern American science fiction. He has published voluminously, his science fiction sells well, and his work continues to be in print. His Stranger in a Strange Land and Starship Troopers have sold in the millions, especially in college bookstores. He has been described as one of the "fathers" of modern science fiction. He is also one of the few science fiction writers who have helped in making science fiction well known in "mainstream" literary circles.

But Heinlein is also a writer whose fiction and ideas often lead to strong feelings and reactions. Throughout his work, Heinlein appears to adopt positions favored by the American political right…. He is enthusiastic about what he considers the importance of military-style discipline to hold a community together. He exhibits a strong respect for custom in his work, although he makes it clear that custom must not stand in the way of societal change. When his heroes are in control of society, Heinlein resists criticism with "love it or leave it"; when they are out of power, he becomes a strong advocate of the right of revolution.

To dwell on the content of his advocacy, however, is to miss the opportunity to take advantage of the insights of his science fiction. Among them are perspectives and issues which relate to some of the perennial concerns of philosophy, such as the best form of government, whether and to what extent political utopias are possible, and the dimensions of power, liberty, equality, justice, and order. Sexuality, family, love, and immortality are also major themes in his fiction. The quality of his style certainly comes in for severe criticism, but the treatment of his subject is frequently insightful.

Plots usually center around a protagonist—the famous "Heinlein hero"—who is always tough, just, relatively fearless when it counts, and endowed with extraordinary skills and physical prowess. The protagonist's most noteworthy characteristic—whether male or female—is "competence." Heinlein defines competence partially as success, partially as ability (in fields like mathematics or engineering), partially as capability for fighting—but, most important, as the capacity to survive. For Heinlein, individual or collective survival is the criterion which seems to shape the structure and thematic apparatus of his fiction. Through it, major political, ethical, and moral questions can be examined. (pp. 7-8)

While Heinlein is concerned with the survival of the group and of the race, his emphasis is on the survival of those individuals within society with the talent and the courage to ensure racial survival—the competent. The view that the survival of the fittest equals the survival of the best finds contemporary expression in his science fiction. Survival for the competent is a prerequisite for the survival of the rest, and from this perspective flows his attitude toward morality.

But one should not be misguided by this simplification, for Heinlein often forces us to recognize basic questions: What kind of political order do we ourselves live in? Does it affirm, reaffirm, or deny our own good qualities as human beings? What instruments, purposes, and values does our own political order serve? What will it serve in the future, and what will it mean in terms of our survival as a species and as individuals? We may be surprised to learn that Heinlein's fiction points less to the importance of technological tools to help us confront the future and more to our need to reexamine ourselves. (pp. 8-9)