Piecemeal Reform in Plato's Laws

Karl Popper has called Plato a dangerous Utopian who offers an unworldly blueprint for society. I argue that, in making this criticism, Popper offers an incomplete reading of Plato's political thought, overlooking the more worldly and modest blueprint of the Laws. In addition, I show that a better understanding of the relationship between the Republic and the Lans - between Plato's philosophical ideal and politically best possible state - demonstrates the necessity of considering Plato's Laws in any discussion of implementation. In fact, a more complete reading of Plato is required by the very criteria Popper employs in advancing his critique. When the political programme of Plato's Laws is viewed in light of Popper's famous distinction between piecemeal social engineering and Utopian social engineering, the problems of applying these characterizations to Plato become apparent.     

"消灭哲学"与实现哲学——读《<黑格尔法哲学批判>导言》

在马克思的早期文献中，“哲学”一词如果不加区别的理解就会得出马克思对哲学存在非连续性和二重化的态度的结论。通过对相关文本群和《〈黑格尔法哲学批判〉导言》的研究发现马克思在使用“哲学”一词上存在双重涵义，即思辨哲学与革命哲学。那么，以此为基础进行解读，马克思的“消灭哲学”命题指的是，消灭黑格尔思辨哲学；实现哲学指的是把哲学理论与革命群众相结合、哲学革命与无产阶级革命相结合。     

Zwischen nationaler Identität und Verfassungspatriotismus: Deutungsmuster der politischen Gemeinschaft in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland 1972–1989

Subject of this study are patterns of interpretation of the political community of the Federal Republic of Germany. This paper has to be seen as a contribution to the interpretative political culture research, whose attention does not apply to subjective attitudes but to intersubjectively recognized normative ideas of the political reality. The significance of “national”, “democratic”, “european” patterns of interpretation is examined in a quantitative-qualitative content analysis of selected debates on the political community of the Federal Republic of Germany. The analysis presents a universalistic value-commitment of the discourse of the West German community.     

柯热夫:主奴辩证法中的欲望关系

柯热夫是20世纪上半叶法国著名思想家,经过他的解读,使黑格尔哲学成功地反击了当时一统天下的新康德主义,而成为法国学界共同的理论基底.他的解读的焦点,是<精神现象学>中的主奴辩证法,其解读逻辑中的最重要的关键词是关系性自我意识和他人的欲望.     

Aquinas's Two Doctrines of Natural Law

This paper examines the role which the concept of natural law has to play in the political thought of Aquinas, as this is to be found in the Summa Theologiae . It focuses particularly on Aquinas's understanding of the relationship which exists between natural and positive law. It argues that Aquinas's views are inconsistent and that the Summa actually contains two quite different positions regarding this subject. One of these is inherited from the Stoic natural law tradition and the other from Aristotle. The former considers natural law to be a critical standard by means of which positive law can be evaluated by individuals, whereas the latter does not. On the contrary, it maintains that according to Aquinas the principles of natural law require interpretation, and that this interpretation is to be provided, not by the conscience of the individual moral agent, but by positive law. Focus on either one or the other of these two documents leads to quite different interpretations of Aquinas's political thought as a whole. One such interpretation sees Aquinas as being a distant forerunner of the liberal political tradition. The other associates Aquinas much more closely with the notion of authority and hence with conservatism in politics. The article concludes by commenting on the relevance of these different interpretations of Aquinas for the contemporary debate between liberals and communitarians.     

A Feminist Utopia

Project Alternative Future is funded by the Norwegian parliament, and its aim is partly the construction of a model for an alternative society It is a Utopian project in the best meaning of the concept. Like Plato's ideal society, the project attempts to combine ambitious visions and concrete thinking. This paper is a discussion of feminist principles on which to base a model for a fundamentally different society. Feminism, as distinct from womanism, is seen as a political ideology criticizing the sexist, patriarchal social structures as well as general structures of domination, competition and violence. A feminist Utopia involves new principles for allocating values; a new ethics based on the principle of reproduction. Feminist theory is criticized for us dualist tradition, and the paper argues for the rationality of aesthetics in addition to the rationality of utility and the rationality of care. Several suggestions as to how to approach a feminist Utopia are made.     

“The Mother of Reason and Revelation”: Benjamin on the Metaphysics of Language

This paper is a reconstruction of Walter Benjamin's philosophy of language, especially as it expressed in 1916's “On Language as Such and the Language of Man”. I read Benjamin's theory as a contribution to what Charles Taylor has called the “expressivist” tradition that includes eighteenth century thinkers like J.G. Herder and J.G. Hamann. Hamann's work and his interpretation of the theological concept of condescension are of particular importance. Although Benjamin's views are often regarded as impenetrable or mystical, they are relevant to and, in part, motivated by concerns of more mainstream twentieth century philosophy of language, in particular Russell's paradox. His “metaphysics of language” understands reference or designation, central to analytic theories of meaning, as derived from a more fundamental, aesthetic meaning.     

Max weber and China’s transition under the new leadership

Some scholars have applied Max Weber’s three ideal types of authority (traditional charismatic and rational-legal) and general transition theory to China. This paper argues that the application of these Weberian concepts is faulty. Weber’s understanding of rationality is specific, a narrow reference to modern Western capitalist rationalization of action. When Weber’s account is forced upon the issues of Chinese political leadership, it simplifies the complexity of historical phenomena, and falls prey to the difficulties of universalism and dualism. Chinese political ideas and practices have developed in a distinctive cultural tradition and may not be able to be fully understood in Western terms and categories. This paper proposes an alternative tongbian interpretation of Chinese politics. His research interests focus on comparative Western and Chinese political philosophy. He has published a number of articles in English and Chinese. He has taught American Politics, International Relations, Western Political Philosophy and Theory, and team-taught ASIAN Nations: China. He is currently teaching Advanced Chinese Language at the Japan American Institute of Management Science (JAIMS) and is a Liaison of Exchange Programs with China at the Center for Chinese Studies, University of Hawai’i at Manoa.     

Leo Strauss: the Ancient as Modern

Although his approach to politics and philosophy were relatively little known outside the United States, Leo Strauss was perhaps the most revered and the most controversial figure in post-war American political science. His followers today form what is arguably the most cohesive intellectual fraternity in the discipline. They constitute a highly influential opposition to the empirical-quantitative course taken by political science and political philosophy.
This study explores Strauss's ideas highlighting the unconventional mixture of substance and style that gives them an arrestingly idiosyncratic character. Substantively, Strauss belonged to the pre-modern intellectual tradition that understood Truth as accessible and knowable through philosophical contemplation. The form of his argumentation, however, his relentless critique of modernity and the moderns, is conducted with all the cognitive weaponry provided for by the modernist intellectual style.     

Milton's Case for a Free Commonwealth

This article will examine the development of John Milton's arguments for democracy as against monarchy and other sorts of autocratic rule. These arguments are interesting both in their own right and insofar as they shed light on historiographical debates concerning the classical republican tradition. Milton is shown to hold a negative conception of liberty, as opposed to a positive or participatory conception, which lends support to the neo-roman interpretation of that tradition, associated with Quentin Skinner and Philip Pettit. However, it is further shown that Sinner and Pettit misunderstand the classical republicans' case for democracy, attributing to them a conceptual argument in place of an empirical one. A better understanding of Milton's political theory contributes to a better understanding of this dilemma, and perhaps suggests a solution.     

Orthodoxy and Dissent in Hinduism’s Meditative Traditions: A Critical Tantric Politics?

Hindu philosophy and its associated meditative traditions have historically been characterized as renunciatory and world-negating, producing an ethic of political passivity, quietism, and indifference. In contrast, I demonstrate here that both the orthodox systems of Hindu philosophy and the heterodox Tantric tradition have been enlisted in service of a variety of socio-political commitments and projects, within and outside India. The more important question is whether these traditions inspire the ossification of conventional hierarchies or the emergence of radical, emancipatory, or liberatory commitments. I argue here that Tantra, a dissident tradition of thought and practice, contains a progressive potential for critiquing and subverting the hierarchical, masculinist politics of gender, sexuality, and caste in contemporary India.     

Quentin Skinner: From Historian of Ideas to Political Scientist

This article is an assessment of Quentin Skinner's contribution to the study of political change and to the contemporary debate in political philosophy. We argue that the significance of Skinner's work to a large extent has been neglected by political scientists, as they have tended to regard him solely as a historian of ideas rather than as a political scientist. However, Skinner's approach not only offers valuable methodological lessons but a historically grounded framework that accounts for the relationship between human agency and the structural language-context, that make actions meaningful. This allows for a conception of historical change that is neither narrowly structuralist nor exclusively focused on the individual agent. In his most recent historical works, Skinner has entered the main debate of contemporary political philosophy, i. e. the debate between liberals and communitarians. Here, his analysis of the classical republican tradition of political thought, attempts a revitalization of the debate beyond the stereotypes of liberalism and Aristotelianism. This work points towards the possibility of developing a radical reconception of modern liberal democracy.     

Deleuze and the liberal tradition: normativity,freedom and judgement

This paper is a critical review article of Paul Patton's book, Deleuze and the Political , and analyzes the relationship between Deleuze and the 'liberal' tradition of political philosophy. It focuses on three concepts drawn from the liberal tradition - normativity, freedom and judgment - and in each case shows how these concepts are capable of being transformed in light of Deleuze's philosophy. For Deleuze, a truly 'normative' principle must be a principle of creation as well as critique: it must not only provide norms for condemning abuses of power, but also a means for transforming norms that have themselves become abuses of power. From a Deleuzian perspective, the normative is thus seen as the condition for the production of the new. The liberal notion of 'negative freedom' in turn finds itself transformed into the stronger notion of 'critical freedom' (Tully), which entails the freedom to critique and create, to transform (and not merely pursue) one's own interest and desires. This entails, finally, an exercise of a kind of judgement outside pre-existing rules or norms that would be truly creative of the new (e.g. the production of new rights). A concluding section of the concept of the 'social imaginary’ shows how Deleuze's work might contribute to a transformation and rejuvenation of the liberal tradition itself.     

The Irish election of November 1982

Changes in centre‐periphery relations, both institutional (most notably decentralisation) and socio‐economic (the growing importance of cities) have radically altered the environment in which French political parties operate. The unprecedentedly close links between parties and the local political system that have resulted have profoundly affected power structures within the parties. Just as the Fifth Republic ‘presidentialised’ parties, so decentralisation has ‘localised’ them. The case of the Rassemblement pour la République, the inheritor to the top‐down, presidentialist tradition of Gaullism, is a remarkable illustration of this transformation.     

Bernard Crick: citizenship and democracy in the United Kingdom

Bernard Crick's contribution to citizenship studies can be regarded as part of the tradition so ably represented by T.H. Marshall. I want to argue in this brief article on Crick that on the one hand he is part of the ‘golden age’ of political philosophy that has flourished in the English-speaking world over the last two or three decades, but on the other his work also shows the limitations of that tradition, at least from the perspective of comparative and historical studies in political sociology. His work was unquestionably ‘local’ in its focus on the subject of Scottish independence and the viability of the British Isles under the governance of a multi-national state.     

The Covenantal Basis for the Development of Swiss Political Federalism: 1291-1848

This study argues that the modern political philosophy of federalismis directly linked to the Swiss Reformed idea of religious covenant,which was first formulated in the 1520s and 1530s by HeinrichBullinger in Zürich. Bullinger's concept of religious covenanthad roots both in the Old Testament and in the early federalideal and reality that had come out of the Swiss Middle Ages;it therefore had important social and political implicationsas well as theological meaning. During the sixteenth and earlyseventeenth centuries, this theological idea of federalism fedinto and helped to create the modern political concept of federalism,especially in the thought of Philippe Duplessis-Mornay and JohannesAlthusius. Political federalism became a reality in the Constitutionof the United States in the late eighteenth century. The Swissfederal Constitution of 1848 was instructed by the mature conceptof political federalism, by the Constitution of the United States,and by the long tradition of Swiss federalism. All of theseinfluences had some basis in the uniquely Swiss idea of religiouscovenant.     

Weber, Wilson, and Hegel: Theories of Modern Bureaucracy

Convergence between Woodrow Wilson's and Max Weber's thought, as well as their differences with regard to the politics–administration dichotomy, can be ascribed to the Hegelian tradition of public administrative theory. On the one hand, Wilson was strongly influenced by Georg W. F. Hegel. On the other hand, there is an empirical connection between Hegel and Weber. Both shared a consciousness of the German bureaucratic tradition based on Hegel's Philosophy of Right . These insights have important methodological and theoretical implications for the contemporary comparative study of public administration.     

Rousseaus Stellung zum utopischen Diskurs der Neuzeit

In the history of political ideas the position of Rousseau’s political theory is controversial. Many historians identify him with the utopian tradition since Thomas More stressed the collective elements in his writings. In contrast to this interpretation it is a widespread thesis that the author of the “Contrat social” must be considered as a representative of the individualistic natural rights. The following study starts with this issue. The authors show that the contractual dimension is predominant in Rousseau’s thinking but it is modified by utopian elements. So Rousseau’s “mixed paradigm” is characteristic for the second part of the 18th century when contractual realism and utopian fiction merged in the dawn of the French Revolution.     

Communitarianism as a Blind Alley? A Reply to Lacey and Frazer

This article seeks to challenge the interpretation of communitarianism offered by Lacey and Frazer (Politics, Vol. 14 No.2). By developing a theory of community it is possible to overcome the problems which they highlight, and to demonstrate that communitarianism, properly understood, is a philosophy which can frame much useful debate in political theory.