It has become common to view Hobbes as a 'liberal', indeed as one of the founders of liberalism. Despite this characterization, there are few works which examine his views on liberty closely. The first part of this paper attempts to explicate what Hobbes says about liberty, mainly in Leviathan, especially in relation to recent philosophical analysis of the subject. In the second part, I examine the relation between Hobbes's views about liberty and other aspects of his political views.

Liberty is central to the republican ideal. Typically the set of rights and liberties of republican citizens will include rights to political participation as well as civil and quasi-political rights and liberties. Republican thinkers have sought to protect citizens' rights, often by institutional arrangements. They have also been concerned to train citizens in the qualities essential to preserve the republic. It should be noted that the status of ‘citizen’ has often not been universally available to those who live in republics. (...) A number of qualifications have usually restricted the right to full citizenship. (shrink)

"This edition can therefore be regarded as the most important republication of a Mandeville text in the last few decades, and should be required reading for anyone seriously concerned to understand the growth of his challenging ideas. " —Professor Irwin Primer in History of Political Thought Volume XXI Issue 4 "Mandeville's contributions to The Female Tatler are almost unknown but they are of fundamental importance for understanding The Fable of the Bees and a social theory that was to be of (...) central importance to the Enlightenment's conception of modernity. The letters belong to the polemical world of early eighteenth-century journalism and have the energy, intelligence and gaiety characteristic of Grub Street at its best. They deal with many of the subjects which Mandeville was to make his own. Unexpectedly and excitedly, they also show how closely his thinking about society was bound up with his interest in the position in contemporary society. Vintage Mandeville, in fact." —Professor Nicholas Phillipson This book collects for the first time since their original publication the 32 papers which Bernard Mandeville (1670-1733), author of The Fable of the Bees (1st ed., 1714), contributed to The Female Tatler (1709-10), one of the many imitators of Richard Steele's Tatler. In these papers, Mandeville's protagonists, the sisters Lucinda and Artesia, discuss and debate the origin and basis of human society and its progress, honour and courage, the value of a life devoted to making money, and most importantly, the position and the virtues of women. The essays are fully annotated, providing significant information about Mandeville's sources and identifying historical and literary references. The volume also includes a substantive introduction by Maurice Goldsmith, a leading expert on Mandeville, explaining the relation of the papers to the social thought of the period and the development of Mandeville's views. The Female Tatler essays systematically address themes further developed in The Fable of the Bees, a work very widely read in the eighteenth century and which was a stimulus to the theories of (among others) David Hume and Adam Smith. The collection will be of interest to scholars of eighteenth-century English literature, history, political and economic thought, women's studies and philosophy. —first publication of these essays since the eighteenth century and the only available edition —extended debate on female virtue is an important element in the development of feminism —Mandeville's defence of luxury and consumption is significant in the history of the discussion of commercial society and capitalism. (shrink)

This rich collection will introduce students of philosophy and politics to the contemporary critical literature on the classical social contract political thinkers Thomas Hobbes , John Locke , and Jean-Jacques Rousseau . A dozen essays and book excerpts have been selected to guide students through the texts and to introduce them to current scholarly controversies surrounding the contractarian political theories of these three thinkers.

With Wrong Turnings, Geoffrey Hodgson has produced perhaps the most ambitious and comprehensive critique of major trends within the global Left—from within the Left—in recent memory. Engaging many...

With Wrong Turnings, Geoffrey Hodgson has produced perhaps the most ambitious and comprehensive critique of major trends within the global Left—from within the Left—in recent memory. Engaging many...

The article discusses poet Oliver Goldsmith's remarks, which illustrates philosopher and historian, David Hume's contemporary reputation. Goldsmith lamented, however, that the praise due to literary merit is already occupied by the first writers, who will keep it and get the better even of the superior merit which the moderns may possess. He said David Hume was one of those, who, seeing the first place occupied on the right side, rather than take a second, wants to have a first (...) in what is wrong. (shrink)

A theory of customary international law -- Case studies -- A theory of international agreements -- Human rights -- International trade -- A theory of international rhetoric -- International law and moral obligation -- Liberal democracy and cosmopolitan duty.

The use of storytelling in the judgment process is based on the necessary assumption that experience and meaning are universal. In place of recognizing legitimate differences in the interpretation of social experience, jurors more often are compelled to regard unfamiliar story elements or dissonant interpretations as signs of guilt. When key elements in a case are anchored in different social worlds, defendants may be found guilty simply by reason of their social experiences and their communication styles. The important question arising (...) from this state of affairs is whether anything can be done to correct biased judgment of trials.Securing access to justice means, at a minimum, recognition for the legitimacy—if not the validity—of one's grievances and aspirations. (shrink)

This collection addresses a post-WWII shift in the hierarchy of scientific explanations, where the highest goal moves from reductionism towards some ...

For the theorists of crisis, the revolutionary state comes into existence through violence, and due to its inability to provide an authoritative katechon (restrainer) against internal and external violence, it perpetuates violence until it self-destructs. Writing during extreme economic depression and growing social and political violence, the crisis theorists––Joseph de Maistre, Juan Donoso Cortés, and Carl Schmitt––each sought to blame the chaos of their time upon the Janus-faced postrevolutionary ideals of liberalism and socialism by urging a return to pre-revolutionary moral (...) and religious values. They are united by three counterrevolutionary principles, all of which are purported to remedy revolutionary violence: traditional constitutional fidelity, the philosophy of the decision, and opposition to bourgeois liberalism. This essay is followed by the first complete English translation and publication of Donoso’s letter of October 24, 1851, which contains Donoso’s only reference to the “discussing class,” a political entity later popularized by Schmitt in his 1922 work Political Theology. (shrink)

Some theories of goodness are descriptively rich: they have much to say about what makes things good. Neo-Aristotelian accounts, for instance, detail the various features that make a human being, a dog, a bee good relative to facts about those forms of life. Famously, such theories of relative goodness tend to be comparatively poor: they have little or nothing to say about what makes one kind of being better than another kind. Other theories of goodness—those that take there to be (...) absolute goodness—are comparatively rich: they offer grounds for judging some types of things better than others because they have more absolute goodness. Moorean accounts, for example, can tell us that humans and human experiences are superior to bees and blades of grass. But such theories tend to be descriptively poor: they struggle to tell us in virtue of what this is so. In this essay we motivate and flesh out a view that splits the difference between accounts of goodness as relative and accounts of goodness as absolute. Such a view holds promise only if the mechanics of this kind of metaphysics of goodness can be worked out. Here we present a view on which the paradigm for absolute goodness is God and the paradigm for each kind of relative goodness is a divine idea. (shrink)

Donald Davidson has made enormous contributions to the philosophy of action, epistemology, semantics and philosophy of mind and today is recognized as one of the most important analytical philosophers of the late twentieth century. _Donald Davidson: Truth, Meaning and Knowledge_ addresses * Davidson's writings on epistemology and theory of language with their implications of ontology and philosophy of mind * the central issue of whether truth is the ultimate goal of enquiry, challenged by contributions from Richard Rorty and Paul Horwich (...) * Davidson's approach to semantics and applied linguistics as addressed by Kirk Ludwig, Gabriel Segal, Peter Pagin, Stephen Neale, Herman Cappelen and Ernie Lepore and Reinaldo Elugardo * Davidson's advances in the philosophy of mind in relation to the views of Williard V. Quine, John McDowell and Peter F. Strawson, in essays by Roger Gibson and Anita Avramides. (shrink)