Istvan Hont
Introduction to the History of Modern Poiiticai Thought:
L
From Locke to Hume
Michelmas Term 1990, first four weeks
Mondays and Wednesdays 10.00
History Faculty, West Road,
(For History Trlpos Part I, Paper 19; Part II, Paper 3;
and SPS Tripos Part II, Paper 17)
[Part II of this course, 'Rousseau and Smith' will be given on Mondays and
Wednesdays 10:00 In the second four weeks of Michaelmas 1990, Part III, 'From
Kant to J.S. Mill' In Lent Term 1991, on Tuesdays and Thursdays 11:00]
Schedule of lectures:
1./ 15 October, Monday:
Introduction: The Idioms of Modern Political Thought
2./ 17 October, Wednesday:
Locke: Property, Civilisation and Consent
3./ 22 October, Monday:
Locke: The Legitimate Polity
4./ 24 October, Wednesday:
Locke: Trust, Toleration and Resistance
5./ 29 October, Monday:
Hume: Justice as an Artflclal Virtue
6./ 31 October, Wednesday:
Hume: The Politics of Commercial Society
7./ 5 November, Monday:
Montesquieu: The Spirit of the Laws and the Principles of Government
8./ 7 November, Wednesday:
Montesquieu: Despotism, Civilisation and Doux Commerce
Texts on which questions will
be set in Section A of the Trioos papers:
John Locke, Two Treatises of Government
David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature. Book III.
Montesquieu, The Soririt of Laws, trans, A. Cohler, B.
Miller and
H.
Stone
Past TriPOS Questions addressed to these texts f 1985-90):
Locke
Were Locke's Two Treatises self-contained and self-explanatory?
What do Locke's argument for toleration tell us about his general political theory?
'One of the clearest legitimations of revolution In English political thought'.
far can this be said of Locke's
How
Two Treatises^
What were the limits on revolutionary activity In the Two Treatises^
Can we elucidate Locke's arguments In the Two
Treatises by studying his other
works?
What were the grounds for revolutionary activity In Locke's Two Treatise^
Why did Locke lay so much
governmental power?
emphasis on
the distinction
between
society
and
Why did Locke make property so central to the argument of the Second TreatiseR
Consider Locke's Two Treatises as an Intervention In the 'Exclusion Controversy'.
Do you find Locke's elimination of consent from the explanation of the origin of
Individual property convincing?
Hume
'What corresponds In Hume's politics to his dislike of religion Is a distaste for all
forms of political enthusiasm'. Discuss.
'Hume simply replaced the social contract with social conventions'.
Discuss.
What effect did Hume's atheism have on his political theory?
What Is sceptical about Hume's political thinking?
What
Is
science'?
the significance
of Hume's claim that
'politics may
be
reduced
to a
8
Forbes, Duncan, 'Natural Law and the Scottish Enlightenment', in R.H.Campbell and
A.S.Sklnner (eds.), ThQ Origins
(Edinburgh, 1982), pp. 186-204,
ami
Nature
of
the
Scottish
Enlightenment.
Moore, James, 'The Two Systems of Francis Hutcheson: On the Origins of the
Scottish Enlightenment' in M.A. Stewart (ed.). Studies In the Philosophy of the
Scottish Enlightenment (Oxford, 1990), pp. 37-59.
Haakonssen, Knud, 'Natural Law and the Scottish Enlightenment' in D. Jory and
J.C. Stewart-Robertson (eds.), Man and Nature/ L'homme et la nature, vol. 4
(1985), pp. 47-80.
Haakonssen, Knud, 'Natural Jurisprudence in the Scottish Enlightenment: Summary
of an Interpretation' in D.N. MacCormick (ed.). Enlightenment. Rights and
Revolutions (Aberdeen, 1989), pp. 36-49.
Pocock, J.G.A., 'Virtues, rights, and manners: A model for historians of political
thought' in Pocock,
Virtue. Commerce and Libertv: Essavs on Political Thought
and Historv. Chieflv in the Eighteenth Centurv (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 37-50.
Pocock, J.G.A., 'Cambridge paradigms and Scotch philosophers: a study of the
relation between the civic humanist anbd the civil jurisprudential interpretation of
eighteenth-century social thought' in I. Hont and M. Ignatieff (eds.). Wealth and
Virtue: THe Shaping of Political Economv in the Scottish Enlightenment (Cambridge,
1983), pp. 235-52.
Mackie, J.L., Hume's Moral Theorv. (London, 1980), Chs. 4-7.
Norton, David Fate, David Hume: Cpmmon Sense Moralist. Sceptical Metaphyalcian,
(Princeton, 1982), Chs. 1-3, 5-6.
Wright, John P., The Sceptical Realism of David Hume (Manchester, 12983), Ch. 5.
Ardai, Pdll S., Passion and Value in Hume's "Treatise" (Edinburgh, 1966), Chs. 6-8.
Livingston, Donald w., Hume's Philosophy of Common Lifa (Chicago, 1984), Chs. 712.
Phiilipson, Nicholas, 'Hume as a Moralist: A Social Historian's Perspective' in S.
Brown (ed.). Philosophers of the Enlightenment (Hassock, Sussex, 1979), pp. 14061.
James T. King, 'The Place of the Language of Morals in Hume's Second "Enquiry"
in D.W.Livingston and J.T.King, Hume: A Re-Evaluation, (New York,1976), pp. 34361.
Moore, James, 'Hume's Theory of Justice and Property', Political Studies 24(1976),
114-19.
Harrison, Jonathan, Hume's Theorv of Justice. (Oxford, 1981)
Whelan, Frederick G., Order and Artifice in Hume's Political Philosoohv (Princeton,
1985), Chs. 4-5.
Cottle, Charles E., 'Justice as Artificial Virtue in Hume's "Treatise'". Journal of the
Historv of Ideas. 40(1979), 457-66.
Castiglione, Dario, 'Hume's conventionalist
Fondazione Luiqi Einaudi. 21(1987), 139-73.
anaiysis
of
justice',
Annali
delia
King, James, 'Hume's Classical Theory of Justice', Hume Studies. 7(1981), 32-54.
Gauthier, David, 'David Hume, Contractarian', Phiiosoohicai Review. 88(1979), 3-38.
Hayek, F.A., 'The Legal and Political Philosophy of David Hume', In V.C.Chappell
(ed.), Hume. (Garden City, N.J., 1966), pp.335-360
Dickinson,
H.T.,
Libertv
and
Property:
Political
Ideoloqv
in
Eiqhteenth-Centurv
Britain (London, 1977)
Robertson, John,
1985), Chs. 2-4.
The
Scottish
Enlightenment and
the
Militia Issue
Wolin, Sheldon 8., 'Hume and Conservatlvism', in D.W.Livingston
Hume: A Re-Evaiuatlon. (New York, 1976), pp. 239-56.
(Edinburgh,
and
J.T.King,
Adair, Douglass, '"That Politics May Be Reduced to a Science": David Hume, James
Madison and the Tenth "Federalist"', in D.W.Livingston and J.T.King, Hume: A ReEvaluation. (New York, 1976), pp.404-417
Pocock, J.G.A., 'Hume and the American Revolution: The Dying Thoughts of a North
Briton', in Pocock, Virtue. Commerce and Liberty: Essays on Political Thought and
History. Chieflv in the Eighteenth Century (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 125-142.
Teichgraeber, Richard F., 'Free Trade' and Moral Philosophy: Rethinking
Sources of Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations" (Durham, N.C., 1986), Ch. 3.
the
Davie, George, 'Berkeley, Hume, and the Central Problem of Scottish Philosophy', in
D.F.Norton, N.Capaidi and W.L.Robison (eds.), McGili Hume Studies. (San Diego,
Austin Hill, 1979), pp.43-62
Popkin, Richard H., 'David Hume: His Pyrrhonism and His Critique of Pyrrhonism',
in V.C.Chappeli, Hume. (Garden City, N.J., 1966), pp. 53-98
Barfoot, Michael, 'Hume and the Culture of Science in the Early Eighteenth
Century' in M.A. Stewart (ed.). Studies in the Phiiosophv of the Scottish
Enlightenment (Oxford, 1990), pp. 151-90.
Popkin, Richard H., 'Hume: Philosophical Versus Prophetic Historian' in K.R. Merrii
and R.W. Shahan (eds.), David Hume: Manv-sided Genius (Norman, Oklahoma, 1976),
pp. 83-95.
Haakonssen, Knud, The Science of a Legislator: The
David Hume and Adam Smith (Cambridge, 1981), Ch. 2.
Natural
Jurisprudence
Miller, David, Philosophy and Ideology in Hume'g Political Thought, (Oxford, 1981)
Mossner, E.C., The Life of David Hume (Oxford, 1970)
Montesquieu
Shkiar, Judith N., Montesquieu (Oxford, 1987)
of
10
Keohane, Nannerl O., Philosophy and the State in France: The Renaissance to the
Enlightenment (Princeton, 1980), Ch. 14.
Hirschmann, Albert O., The Passions and the Interests:
Capitalism before Its Triumph (Princeton, 1977).
Political
Arguments
for
Berlin, Isaiah, 'Montesquieu' in Berlin, Against the Current: Essavs in the History
of Ideas (Oxford, 1981), pp. 130-161.
Plamenatz, John, 'Montesquieu'
1963), pp. 253-298.
in
Plamenatz, Man
and
Society,
vol. 1
Cranston, Maurice, 'Montesquieu' in Cranston, Philosophers and
Political Theorists of the Enlightenment (Oxford, 1986), pp. 9-35.
(London,
Pamphleteers:
Shackleton, Robert, Montesquieu: A Critical Biography (Oxford, 1961)
Pangle, Thomas L., Montesouieiu's Philosophy of Liberalism: A Commentary on 'The
Spirit Of the Laws'(Chicago, 1973).
Baker, Keith M., 'Public Opinion as Political Invention'
French Revolution:
Essays on
French Political
in Baker, Inventing the
Culture inb the Eighteenth
Century
(Cambridge, 1990), pp. 167-99.
Ellis, Harold E., 'Montesquieu's Modern Politics: "The Spirit of the Laws" and the
Problem of Modern Monarchy in Old Regime France', History of Political Thought
10(1989), 665-700.
Keohane, Nanneri O., 'Virtuous Republics and Glorious Monarchies: Two Models in
Montesquieu's Political Thought', Political Studies 20(1972), 383-96.
Price, E.H., 'Voltai re and
Montesquieu's Three Principles of
Publications of the Modern Language Association 57(1942), 1046-52.
Government',
Richter, Melvin, 'Despotism' in P.H. Wiener (ed.). Dictionary of the History of Ideas,
vol. 2 (New York, 1973), pp. 1-18.
Richter, Melvin, 'Montesquieu, the Politics of Language,
Polities', Historv of Political Thought 10(1989), 71-88.
and
the
Language of
Hundert, E.J. and Nelles, P., 'Liberty and Theatrical Space in Montesquieu's
Political Theory: THe Poetics of Public Life in "The Persian Letters'", Political
Theory 17(1989), 223-46.
Riley, Patrick, The General Will
Before Rousseau: The Transformation of the Divine
into the civio (Princeton, 1986), ch. 4.
Althusser, Louis, 'Montesquieu: Politics and History' in Aithusser, Politics and
Historv: Montesquieu. Rousseau. Hegel and Marx, trans. B. Brewster (London, 1972),
pp. 9-109.
Manicas, P.T., 'Montesquieu and the Eighteenth-Century
Historv of Political Thought 2(1981), 313-17.
Vision
of
the
State',
Huiiiung, Mark, Montesquieu and the Old Regime (Berkeley, 1976).
Waddicor, Mark
1970).
H.,
Montesquieu and the Philosophy of Natural
Law
(The Hague,
11
Baum, Alan, Montesquieu and Social Theory (Oxford, 1979)
Rosow, Stephen J., 'Commerce, Power and Justice:
Polities', Review of Politics 46(1984), 346-66.
Montesquieu on
International
Devietogiou, Nicos E., 'Montesquieu and the Wealth of Nations', Canadian Journal of
Economics and Political Science 29(1963), 1-25.
Martin, Kingsley, French Liberal Thought in the Eighteenth Centurv: A Study of
Political Ideas from Bavie to Condorcet. 3rd ed. (London, 1962), Ch. 6.
Carcassone, E., Montesquieu et la problems de la constitution francaise au XVIIIe
si^cle (Paris, 1927).
Fletcher, F.T.H., Montesquieu and English Politics: 1750-1800. (London, 1939).
Richter, Melvin, 'Introduction'
(Cambridge, 1977), pp. 1-105.
In
Richter,
Manin, Bernard, 'Montesquieu et la
Dolltique. Nos. 2-3 (1984-5), 157-229.
The
Political
politique moderne',
Theory of
Cahiers
de
Montesquieu
Dhilosophie
Cohler, Anne M., Montesquieu's Comparative Politics and the Spirit of American
Constitutionalism (Lawrence, Kansas, 1988)