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Glory and the Law in Hobbes
No full textA central argument of the Leviathan has to do with the political importance of education. Hobbes wants his book to be taught in universities and expounded much in the manner that Scripture was. Only thus will citizens realize what is in their hearts as to the nature of good political order. Glory affects this process in two ways. The pursuit of glory by a citizen leads to political chaos and disorder. On the other hand, God’s glory is such that one can do nothing but acquiesce to it. The Hobbesian sovereign shares some of the effects of glory that God has naturally; this, however, has to be supplemented by awe and that but fear
Heidegger, the <i>Polis</i>, the political, and <i>Gelassenheit</i>
No full textWhat is Heidegger's understanding of the political?The recent publication of the so-called “Black Notebooks” has once again brought to a polemical forefront the question of the importance of Heidegger's Nazism for his philosophical thought. Yet in the swirling controversy, the question of Heidegger's understanding of the political – that is, of a particular form of relations between human beings – has tended to be obscured by his apparent endorsement of the Nazi regime. I make here the distinction made easily in French between “le politique” – the political – and “la politique” – politics – and argue that Heidegger has a serious understanding of “the political” that is not necessarily coincident with his appreciation of politics – although he may have either thought or hoped it was
The obstinance of voice
No full textComparaison on Nietzsche and Rousseau on music, language and the politica
Politics without vision: thinking without a banister in the twentieth century
No full textFrom Plato through the nineteenth century, the West could draw on comprehensive political visions to guide government and society. Now, for the first time in more than two thousand years, Tracy B. Strong contends, we have lost our foundational supports. In the words of Hannah Arendt, the state of political thought in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries has left us effectively “thinking without a banister.”Politics without Vision takes up the thought of seven influential thinkers, each of whom attempted to construct a political solution to this problem: Nietzsche, Weber, Freud, Lenin, Schmitt, Heidegger, and Arendt. None of these theorists were liberals nor, excepting possibly Arendt, were they democrats—and some might even be said to have served as handmaidens to totalitarianism. And all to a greater or lesser extent shared the common conviction that the institutions and practices of liberalism are inadequate to the demands and stresses of the present times. In examining their thought, Strong acknowledges the political evil that some of their ideas served to foster but argues that these were not necessarily the only paths their explorations could have taken. By uncovering the turning points in their thought—and the paths not taken—Strong strives to develop a political theory that can avoid, and perhaps help explain, the mistakes of the past while furthering the democratic impulse.Confronting the widespread belief that political thought is on the decline, Strong puts forth a brilliant and provocative counterargument that in fact it has endured—without the benefit of outside support. A compelling rendering of contemporary political theory, Politics without Vision is sure to provoke discussion among scholars in many fields
Review: Stephen Kalberg. Searching for the Spirit of American Democracy: Max Weber’s Analysis of a Unique Political Culture, Past, Present, and Future. Boulder, CO: Paradigm, 2014. Pp. xii+158. $19.95.
No full textReview of a book on max Weber and Americ
In defense of rhetoric: or how hard it is to take a writer seriously: the case of Nietzsche
No full textInterpretations of Nietzsche, particularly about politics, cover an exceptionally wide range. Additionally, Nietzsche is often said to commit “rhetorical excesses.” I argue and show that Nietzsche consciously crafted his published works to allow this range of interpretations, that he did this for critical purposes, and that his so-called rhetoric is there to serve this purpose
Truth, facts, alternates and persons: Or, whatever has happened to postmodernism?
No full textHaving spent much of my professional career in an attempt to understand and make the thought of Nietzsche and others available, what am I to do with the apparent arguments of post-modernists and even more with the claims to “alternate facts,�? “post-truth,�? the denial of climate warming and so forth? I approach this through a rereading of Thomas Kuhn and Ludwig Wittgenstein and seek to argue against a kind of Habermasian Einverstand and for the claim that we should not be first concerned with lies (which will always be a losing game) but with the quality of the person making an assertion (we used to call this his or her “soul�?). Our problem is not knowledge but allowing oneself to be acknowledged by another, and in turn acknowledge him or her.</p
Politics and The Political in the “Berkeley School” of Political Theory
No full textWhy there was a "Berkeley School"; what it was; why it is no more
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Knowledge or Power: Heinrich Meier and the Case For Political Philosophy
Get PDFThis dissertation investigates Platonic political philosophy as a possible means for understanding the relationship between knowledge and power. Via a close reading of Heinrich Meier's early work on Carl Schmitt and Leo Strauss, it attempts to articulate how political philosophy in Meier's sense works, as well as to carry out in actu a piece of interpretation in accord with its characteristic approach. It finds that Meier "purifies" (kathairo) the figures of Schmitt and Strauss into the exemplars of political theology and political philosophy, respectively; that he traces postmodern relativism back to its roots in a moral-theological view associated with revelation; that he is able in this way to sharpen the distinction between political theology and political philosophy, and, more generally, between the orders of knowledge and of power; and that these orders, despite much obvious interpenetration, are incommensurable in view of their extreme cases. Further, it finds that political philosophy operates in the interrogative mode for questioning the assertions and commands of political and theological authorities, and the hypothetical subjunctive mode for protecting itself, and philosophy generally, from persecution at the hands of such authorities; in addition, it employs these modes to gain insight into its own possibility and necessity, or to progress in self-knowledge. Finally, it finds that political philosophy makes a characteristic turn (periagoge) toward the good, and that this is only justified if the good sticks to the real or if truth is somehow primary or if not everything is possible
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