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POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY - MODERN |
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Although Thomas More (picture) did not live in accordance with the ideas developed in his Utopia (1516), he was a man of principles and became a martyr to his convictions. In the book Utopia, after which numerous utopias have been named, More described an imaginary island where a perfectly wise and happy people had established the best imaginable commonwealth by means of ideal institutions, living in peace and abhorring war and oppression of any kind. More, however, had to live in Tudor England, and, although his spiritual horizon was larger and his moral consciousness was scrupulous, he had to adapt his thoughts and actions to the customs of his contemporary fellow Englishmen and, above all, to the desires of the king. For a time he seemed to be a conformist but when he had to choose between his loyalty to the king and the demands of his conscience, he decided against the royal arbitrary power and faced executive with equanimity. Having intended to become a priest, More spent four years, from 1499 to 1503, in religious contemplation. Then he suddenly abandoned the idea of ecclesiastical life. Nevertheless, he remained a pious Catholic, although devoted to the "new learning" of humanism. He was an intimate friend of John Colet and Erasmus and participated in their efforts to reform the Catholic Church, to purify religious life and to reconcile religious traditions with the new science of humanism. He wrote poetry, books about English history, a biography of Pico della Mirandola, and protected the painter Hans Holbein and other artists. After being elected member of Parliament in 1504, he had a brilliant career, was knighted in 1521, and succeeded Cardinal Wolsey as Lord Chancellor of England in 1529. But he was opposed to King Henry VIII's Act of Supremacy and Act of Succession because the former meant the secession from the Roman Catholic Church, and the latter the nullification of the king's first marriage. The whole of Catholic Europe was startled when it learned that More was executed for his decision to disobey the King. As a prisoner in the Tower, More wrote his Dialogue of Comfort Against Tribulation and died as an upright and courageous man. In The Radical Academy Elsewhere On The Internet
Tommaso Campanella (1568-1639) A resident of Naples, Tommaso Campanella (picture) was sentenced to lifetime imprisonment during the Spanish rule, for political plotting and heresy. During this time, he wrote a valiant and courageous vindication of Galileo, who had been tried by the Inquisition. After twenty-seven years of incarceration, Campanella succeeded in escaping to France, where he remained for the remainder of his life under the aegis of Cardinal Richelieu. His work was a source of inspiration for Mersenne and other French philosophers; as well as Leibniz. His philosophy was a blend of medieval thought combined with the methods of modern science. A Dominican and partisan of the secular power of the Pope, his communistic utopia, outlined in City of the Sun, was ruled by an ideal Pope. Campanella regarded the world as the "living statue of God." Eternal truth is perceptible through the study of nature and the Bible. Many of his ideas are similar to those of modern-day existentialists; for to him, neither the reports of the senses nor the speculations of reason, but only the feelings of one's own existence offer a reliable basis for the knowledge of God, man, and nature. Preservation of existence is the aim of all human activities, and the laws that make for this preservation not only compel man to love God, but also to make him desire to return to Him. In The Radical Academy
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Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527) Machiavelli (picture) was a statesman, writer, and political theorist born in Florence, Italy. Little is known of his early life, but he traveled on several missions in Europe for the Republic of Florence (1498-1512). On the restoration of the Medici, he was arrested on a charge of conspiracy and, though pardoned, was obliged to withdraw from public life. He devoted himself to literature, writing historical treatises, poetry, short stories, and comedies. His masterpiece is The Prince (1532,, whose main theme is that all means may be used in order to maintain authority, and that the worst acts of the ruler are justified by the treachery of the governed. It was condemned by the pope, and its viewpoint gave rise to the adjective "machiavellian." In The Prince, Machiavelli was concerned with a principality, a state in which one ruler or a small elite governs a mass of subjects who have no active political life. Machiavelli addressed a monarchical ruler and offered advice designed to keep that ruler in power. He recommended policies that would discourage mass political activism and channel the subjects' energies into private pursuits. Machiavelli's aim was to persuade the monarch that he could best preserve his power by using violence carefully and economically, by respecting the persons, property, and traditions of his subjects, and by promoting material prosperity. Machiavelli did not construct an abstract and unified philosophical system. Rather, his orientation was practical, and his method was empirical and impressionistic. His political writings contain a series of generalizations -- taken from ancient and contemporary history -- about the possibilities and limitations of various courses of political action. One of the most distinctive and controversial characteristics of Machiavelli's thought is that he did not devote much attention to the values that define the ends of political action. Instead he concentrated on distinguishing those circumstances in which a political act will have morally justified consequences from those circumstances in which it will not. In his view, political actions, much more than the activities of private life, have consequences that cannot be foreseen or fully controlled. Therefore, political life cannot be governed by a single set of moral or religious absolutes, and the political agent may sometimes be excused for performing acts of violence and deception that would be ethically indefensible in private life. In The Radical Academy
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Grotius (picture), sometimes referred to by his Dutch name Hugues De Groot, was already a highly successful lawyer in Leyden by the age of sixteen after receiving his doctorate in law from the University of Orleans. He was a precocious child who wrote Latin and Greek poems at an early age, became a student at the University of Leyden at age 11, and was described by King Henry IV of France as "The marvel of Holland" at age 15. He was appointed official historiographer of Holland at age 18, and excelled as a jurist, theologian, historian, philologist, poet and diplomat. In 1619, after the defeat of the Dutch republicans and having aligned himself with Johan van Oldenbarnevelt in his unsuccessful political and religious struggle against Maurice of Nassau, Grptius was tried by the victorious monarchists and sentenced to prison for life in the fortress of Loevestein. He escaped in 1621 by hiding in a chest of books and fled to France. Grotius returned to Holland in 1631 but was again forced to flee, going first to Hamburg and later to Stockholm where, in 1633, Swedish chancellor Count Axel Oxenstierna appointed him Sweden's minister to Paris, where he accomplished a number of difficult tasks while negotiating with Richelieu. He held that position for about fifteen years, but he relinquished the post in 1645 and was offered a position on the Swedish council of state by Queen Christina, an honor that he declined. On the way back to Holland from Sweden, Grotius was shipwrecked and died two days later in Rostock, Germany. Although he lived much of his life as an exile, he was internationally respected as a scholar, and was later recognized by his own country as one of the greatest Dutchmen of all times. Grotius was not the first to expound natural law, but he was first to construct a system of international jurisprudence in which the distinction between natural and historical law was essential. According to Grotius, the principle of natural morality is written by God in the hearts and minds of mankind. It is to be ascertained by reason. On the other hand, the existing institutions and laws of the nations are products of human will. The ultimate end of legal development must be the establishment of the supreme command of natural law. For the time being, some minimum demands must be formulated in order to eliminate license in making and conducting war. His most important work, On the Law of Peace and War (1625) -- the first comprehensive text on international law -- was directed against arbitrary power policy and radical pacifists, although just wars were admitted. Using biblical, classical, and scholarly sources, Grotius set forth an international law that recognized the necessity for war under certain conditions -- his doctrine of the just war -- but attempted to make its impact less devastating on individuals. Previously, in his Mare Liberum (Open Seas, 1609), Grotius had tried to secure the rights of neutral ships against ruthless force on the parts of Portugal, Spain and England. This work was an important defense of freedom of the high seas. In addition to his legal writings, Grotius wrote poetry and history, translated Greek and Latin poetry, and discoursed on ecclesiastical matters. He also had a great effect on Old Testament exegesis by his cold lucidity which secured his independence of Christian traditions and enabled him to recognize the historical uniqueness of the Hebrew Bible. Grotius' emphasis on a precise, secular natural law was very influential in political philosophy and his major work is read and discussed today in classes in political theory, history of political thought, and international law. In The Radical Academy Elsewhere On The Internet
Thomas Hobbes (picture) was born in Malmesbury, Wiltshire, in England. He studied at Oxford, then began a long tutorial association with the Cavendish family, through which he traveled widely. After being introduced to Euclidean geometry, he thought to extend its method into a comprehensive science of man and society. Obsessed by the civil disorders of his time, he wrote several works on government. In 1646 he became mathematical tutor to the Prince of Wales at the exiled English court in Paris, where, in 1651, he wrote his masterpiece of political philosophy, Leviathan. In 1652 he returned to England, submitted to Oliver Cromwell, and settled in London. After the Restoration he was given a pension. Born prematurely due to his mother's anxiety over the approach of the Spanish Armada, Hobbes had a streak of timidity in him which did not jibe with the philosophy propounded in his Leviathan and Behemoth. Influenced by the greatest thinkers of the times -- among them Descartes, Gassendi and Galileo, whom he met on the Continent as tutor to Charles II and during an 11-year self-imposed, needless exile -- Hobbes professed materialism, seeking to explain everything on mechanical principles. All knowledge comes by way of the senses, he held, and the objects of knowledge are material bodies obeying physical forces. Man too, in his natural state is "brutish and nasty." Realizing, that if man were to continue as wolf to man, chaos and destruction would result, men have, therefore, entered into a social contract, delegating the control of their fellow men to the state, which is governed and thus insures them a measure of security. In essence, therefore, the state and the kingship is a thing bargained for. Uninfluenced by Francis Bacon, whose secretary he was for a time, "gaping on mappes" while supposed to be studying at Oxford, reading few books, getting himself into trouble with every publication because either conceptions or Parliament had changed, absorbed in mathematics for which he did not have the talent to make original contributions, and translating Homer and other Greeks, he attained the age of 89 complaining of having trouble keeping the flies "from pitching on the baldness" of his head. With consistency he had resisted the gains of the Renaissance as well as the resuscitation of scholasticism. His books were condemned by Parliament. Although the clergy hated him as an atheist, he nevertheless played safe by affiliating himself with a church and showing devoutness in the face of death. In The Radical Academy
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Baron Charles-Louis de Secondat de Montesquieu (1689-1755) Montesquieu (picture) was a philosopher and jurist who was born at Chateau La Brede near Bordeaux, France. He was educated at Bordeaux and became an advocate, but turned to scientific research and literary work. He settled in Paris in 1726, then spent some years traveling and studying political and social institutions. His best-known work is the comparative study of legal and political issues, The Spirit of Laws (1748), which was a major influence on 18th century European political thought. The principle of separation of powers, or of checks and balances, which is characteristic of the Constitution of the United States was formulated in such a striking manner by Montesquieu that Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, John Adams, and James Madison and other founders of the United States were deeply impressed by it, and held it more or less clearly in their minds when they gave the Constitution is shape. Montesquieu was a high judge in France but he was very critical of the regime which he served. In his youth he had been a member of the "First Floor Club" in Paris, a secret society strongly opposed to absolutism and clerical orthodoxy. He remained faithful to the club's principles but became rather moderate in his judgment on the advantages of other political systems. His Persian Letters (1721), a thinly veiled satirical criticism of French life, made a great sensation. His Reflections on the Causes of the Greatness and the Decadence of the Romans (1734) is considered one of the most important monuments of modern historical literature. The very spirit of Roman civilization is grasped and brilliantly illustrated by Montesquieu, however much scholars of later times may object to his treatment of details. Montesquieu's major work, The Spirit of Laws (1748), was the result of fourteen years of strenuous study into political history and comparative legislation, of reading sources and observing life by traveling through many countries of Europe, and above all, of a stay in England where he arrived on Lord Chesterfield's yacht. Montesquieu admired England, though not uncritically. Its institutions, in his opinion, guaranteed and realized the highest possible degree of freedom, and he derived this view from the application of the principle of checks and balances. This view is not shared by modern constitutional historians or jurists, least of all concerning the England of Montesquieu's days. But his work has been of lasting value to the development of methods of analyzing political, social and legal conditions and their connection. Next to John Locke, Montesquieu was the most influential champion of liberalism in the 18th century. Some ideas put forth by Montesquieu have had an influence on Classical Liberalism. In The Radical Academy
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Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) Jean Jacques Rousseau (picture) was born in Geneva, Switzerland. His mother died in childbirth, and he was raised as a Calvinist by an aunt. Leaving Geneva in 1728, he led an unsettled life but came under the protection of Madame de Warens at Chambery; she influenced his conversion to Catholicism. After serving briefly as a tutor at Lyon, he set out for Paris in 1742, where a new system of musical notation he had developed attracted the attention of Denis Diderot. Diderot invited him to contribute articles on music to the Encyclopedie. In 1745, Rousseau met an uneducated servant girl, Therese Le Vasseur, with whom he had a number of illegitimate children. In 1754 he reconverted to Protestantism. Rousseau was the first to diagnose, from secular aspects, the symptoms of the crisis of modern civilization. Both his approach and many of his conclusions have been exposed to criticism. Nevertheless, he gave us an early and powerful expression of a current of thoughts and sentiments that transformed cultural life and that has not yet come to an end in the age of two world wars. Both modern civilization and the entire history that shaped its features were condemned by Rousseau as deviation from nature. Rousseau asserted that every man has a unique personality, and that all men are equal. But, in his eyes, state and society are the triumph of oppression, men have become unequal because of artificial conventions, and cultural life is degenerating more and more because vital needs of the human heart are neglected. He demanded a radical reform that does not mean return to primitive barbarism, but rather, a restitution of the natural order in which reason and sentiments become harmonized, and in which man meets his fellow man with neither artificial subordination nor any intention of subordinating him, both respecting the general will which is expressed by the majority of citizens. Rousseau's criticism was determined to a large degree by his sense of justice and his aesthetic sentiments. In this way, he became the precursor of the French Revolution, and caused a literary revolution that started soon after the publication of his principal works. His call "back to nature" was echoed by the masses of oppressed peoples and by individuals who longed for a free development of their faculties. Since Rousseau, sincerity and intensity of feelings and expression, rather than formal perfection, have become the principal criteria of literary and artistic criticism. Rousseau enhanced the effects of his teachings by the charm and vigor of his style and, even more, by the unrestrained exhibition of his inner life, for he was by no means afraid of showing his flaws and vices to the public. His political doctrine emphasizes that the sovereignty belongs to the people. His religious creed is a deism that relies more on feelings than on reason, without excluding rational principles. Rousseau's literary influenced remained strong from the times of Goethe and Byron to the days of Robert Louis Stevenson and D.H. Lawrence. Among the philosophers, his most important disciples, were Kant, Fichte and Hegel and, not the least among them, Karl Marx. In politics, Maximilian Robespierre was Rousseau's most devoted follower. Notwithstanding the excesses of the French Revolution, Rousseau continued to be regarded the apostle of democracy, although it was discovered that some of the aspects of his philosophy favor totalitarian dictatorship. In his first publication, Discourse on the Arts and Sciences (1750), Rousseau articulated the fundamental theme that runs through his social philosophy: the conflict between present societies and the nature of man. In 1762 he published his best-known and most-influential works, Emile, a treatise on education, and The Social Contract, a major work of political philosophy. At this point Rousseau's personality difficulties became more acute. Always an emotional and temperamental man, he quarreled with Diderot and the other philosophes. In 1766 he moved to England at the invitation of the great Scottish philosopher David Hume, with whom he subsequently had a falling out that became a scandal. Increasingly, Rousseau displayed all of the classic symptoms of paranoia. His last years were spent on works such as his Confessions, in which he attempted to come to terms with himself. He died on July 2, 1778, in Paris. In The Radical Academy
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Edmund Burke (picture) was born in Dublin on January 12, 1729, and was perhaps the most brilliant and original thinker ever to sit in the British House of Commons. He graduated from Trinity College, Dublin, and led an impecunious life as a young man. He trained to become a lawyer in London but showed an inclination to literature and philosophy in his early essays A Vindication of Natural Society (1756) and A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful (1757). He committed himself to a political career by entering the service of the marquess of Rockingham in 1765 and took a seat in Parliament the same year. In the following years Burke did much to mold and still more to express the principles of the Rockingham faction of the Whig party, notably in his Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents (1770), in which he argued the value of political parties, and in his speeches defending the rights of the American colonists ("On American Taxation," 1774; "On Conciliation with the Colonies," 1775). He favored moderate reform to secure the independence of the House of Commons from crown influence, carrying a bill to that end as paymaster general of forces in the short-lived Rockingham ministry of 1782, but he opposed fundamental reform of Parliament and a reduction in the privileges of the Anglican church. He was concerned to defend the interests of the subjects of the British Empire in India as well as America and played a prominent, though controversial, part in the impeachment (1787-94) of Warren Hastings. In this, as in other periods of life, he was the object of much malicious criticism, some of it related to his relatively humble origins and Irish background. The political pamphlets, parliamentary speeches, and essays of Burke proved him to be a genuine philosopher. His contemporaries, regardless of whether they shared his opinions, admired his talent for discerning the basic principles and elucidating the philosophical issues inherent in the disputes and interests of practical matters. Some of his essays, like The Sublime and the Beautiful, manifest the influence of Kant, Hegel, and many aestheticians of the eighteenth century. Despite his philosophical attitude toward the events of contemporary politics, Burke was always an ardent partisan, for his theoretical insights blended with his factious spirit and his realism with his romanticism. His morality demanded a rigorous honesty and cautious regard for actual circumstances, traditions, and expediences. He was always prepared to combat imminent dangers and great evil. For more than three decades, Burke participated in political struggles. An Irishman by birth, and master of the English language, he was one of the greatest orators in the history of the British Parliament. Basically, he was convinced that the human individual is incapable of creating newness; that all useful and legitimate innovations must result from the slow growth of the collective mind in accordance with tradition. He strongly opposed changes in the British Constitution, whose excellent form was dogma to him. He fought for the removal of administrative abuses; opposed corruption, particularly the attempts of King George III to enslave both houses of Parliament. He denounced the French Revolution as a crime because it manifested a break with the past, served as a challenge to true wisdom and experience, and was a threat to liberty and prosperity. With his derision of the theory of the "Rights of Man," Burke became the vanguard of the European counter-revolution. Burke's last years were perhaps his most influential. He denounced the French Revolution, advised the prime minister William Pitt the Younger, and became a bitter enemy of his old friends in the Whig party. His most famous piece, Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), was a forceful attack on the principles of the Revolution; although extravagantly expressed, it made him the international apostle of counterrevolution, and in some measure the founder of the modern conservative tradition. Burke died on July 9, 1797. In The Radical Academy Elsewhere On The Internet
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