Conscience and Empire: Politics and Moral Theology in the Early Modern Portuguese World

2014 ◽  
Vol 18 (5) ◽  
pp. 473-494 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giuseppe Marcocci
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Moral Theology ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Language ◽  
Imperial Ideology ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Political Vocabulary

This article presents the first reconstruction of the relationship between conscience and empire in the Portuguese World between 1500 and 1650. It shows to what extent the foundation of the Mesa da Consciência (“Board of Conscience”), a royal council of theologians devoted to issues like war, commerce, conversion, and slavery, shaped the imperial ideology. In this context, “conscience” emerged as a keyword in the political vocabulary, reflecting the importance of moral theology for the political language in which the empire was conceived. It not only bolstered the hegemony of theologians but also encouraged the emergence of a missionary casuistry, which became increasingly independent of the central authorities in the kingdom and in Rome. Under the Habsburg domination (1580-1640) this system was dismantled and theologians lost their centrality at court. After the Restoration of 1640 some of the old institutions were recovered in name, but the old interconnection between politics and moral theology was not re-installed.

scholarly journals Looking for democracy in fiduciary government. Historical notes on an unsettled relationship (ca. 1520-1650)

Daímon ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 17-32
Author(s):  
David Guerrero
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
State Power ◽  
Public Law ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Popular Sovereignty ◽  
The Political ◽  
Fiduciary Duties ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Normative Foundations

Una perspectiva reciente sobre los fundamentos normativos del derecho público ha propuesto concebir las relaciones entre ciudadanía y Estado como una “relación fiduciaria”, usando deberes fiduciarios del ámbito iusprivado para justificar limitaciones jurídicas y morales al poder del Estado. La gobernanza fiduciaria también ha sido señalada como una característica distintiva del republicanismo y la soberanía popular, ya que sitúa a la comunidad política como fideicomitente y beneficiaria de cualquier acto administrativo. En este artículo se revisan algunas concepciones protomodernas del gobierno considerando sus justificaciones explícitamente fiduciarias. Concluye con una interpretación fiduciaria del iusnaturalismo Leveller, especialmente necesario para entender (y puede que restaurar) la relación de la gobernanza fiduciaria con la democracia.   A recent perspective on the normative foundations of public law has proposed to conceive citizen-state relationships as a “fiduciary relationship”, using private-law fiduciary duties to justify legal and moral constrains on state power. Fiduciary governance has also been pointed as a distinct feature of republicanism and popular sovereignty, since it places the political community as trustor and beneficiary of any administrative act. This paper reviews some early modern conceptions of government considering their explicit fiduciary justifications. It concludes with a fiduciary account of Leveller natural law, especially needed to understand (and maybe to restore) the relationship between fiduciary governance and democracy.

scholarly journals Contextual meanings of political vocabulary

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 448-457
Author(s):  
Denis L. Karpov ◽  
Daria A. Soloveva
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Russian Language ◽  
Contextual Analysis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Consciousness ◽  
Political Language ◽  
Specific Nature ◽  
Political Sphere ◽  
Political Vocabulary ◽  
The Russian Language

Political vocabulary is one of the most relevant subjects of study of modern linguistics, constantly updated, it serves as an indicator of the state of the political sphere of society and the political consciousness of a person. The article is devoted to lexemes that have firmly entered the current political vocabulary of our time: democracy, liberal, patriotism, patriot, nationalism, nationalist, opposition, president. Based on the analysis of modern explanatory dictionaries of the Russian language, as well as the dictionary of political terms, it is concluded that terminological, special vocabulary in the modern political language is often used in an unusual meaning. In the article, using the method of contextual analysis, the evaluative connotative element of the meaning of the indicated lexemes is investigated. It is concluded that lexemes acquire a positive or negative evaluative value, first of all, depending on the context, the actual terminological meaning is leveled when used. The revealed meanings are non-systemic, accordingly, they are not fixed in dictionaries, while they are obvious to the carrier and are frequent. This indicates the specific nature of the modern political language, which is influenced by the modern journalistic style. The research results can be used to analyze controversial cases of the use of political vocabulary.

Diplomatic Parrhesia and the Ethos of Trustworthiness in Hotman’s The Ambassador and Shakespeare’s Henry V

2020 ◽  
Vol 50 (3) ◽  
pp. 609-631
Author(s):  
Nathalie Rivère de Carles
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Language ◽  
Henry V ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
Definition Of

Sir Henry Wotton’s definition of an ambassador as “an honest man sent to lie abroad for the good of his country” should be confronted with his later assessment that the ambassador “should alwayes, and upon all occasions speak the truth … ’twill also put [his] Adversaries (who will still hunt counter) to a loss in all their disquisitions, and undertakings.” Wotton’s contrasting views point to the early modern concern with true, bold, and plain speech, known as parrhesia, and its importance in diplomatic practice. Combining Quentin Skinner’s rhetorical approach to political language and Timothy Hampton’s literary analysis of diplomacy, this essay examines Shakespeare’s mirror of diplomatic speech featured in Henry V (ca. 1599) in light of Jean Hotman’s reflections on parrhesia in The Ambassador (1603). Analyzing theoretical and dramatic views of parrhesiastic speech in early modern diplomacy, the essay argues for diplomatic parrhesia as a matter of trustworthiness rather than sincerity. Shakespeare introduces a new perspective on the ambassador’s speech and its function and on the capacity of authorities to hear truthful speech, while reasserting the political necessity of good parrhesia.

Introduction

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Sarah Mortimer
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Economic Change ◽  
The Political ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Political Ideas ◽  
Political Communities ◽  
The Relationship

The introduction sets out the main themes of the book and the approach taken. It characterizes political thought as the analysis and examination of how earthly communities flourish, as distinct from other kinds of communities like churches or households. It argues that although the period began with the consolidation of large empires, there was a growing concern to understand and to defend local or regional political communities, and that these developments were shaped by social and economic change. It emphasizes the need to see the political ideas and aspirations of early modern people within the context of their other desires and aspirations, and the context of their specific historical situations. It shows how the approach taken in this book builds upon the existing work of scholars and historians. It also sets out the distinctive features of the book: the inclusion of lands beyond Europe, the emphasis on natural law, and the relationship between political thought and social change.

Introduction

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Tim Stuart-Buttle
Keyword(s):  
Modern Philosophy ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
David Hume ◽  
John Locke ◽  
Moral Theology ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Recent Scholarship ◽  
Historical Relationship ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter introduces the key themes and questions to be explored in the work. In particular, it discusses the tendency of much recent scholarship on early-modern philosophy to emphasize the importance of two late Hellenistic philosophical traditions: the Stoic and the Epicurean. It indicates that three important British writers—John Locke, Conyers Middleton, and David Hume—deliberately and explicitly aligned their approaches with Cicero, as the representative of an alternative philosophical tradition: academic scepticism. This, they argued, offered the conceptual resources more satisfactorily to address a question that contemporaries recognized to be particularly pressing: the relationship between moral theology and moral philosophy. It further yielded highly distinctive narratives of the historical relationship between classical moral philosophy and the Christian moral theology which had appropriated and displaced it. These narratives were in turn challenged by Shaftesbury and Mandeville, who placed themselves (respectively) within the Stoic and Epicurean traditions.

scholarly journals GENDER IN THE HISTORY OF EARLY MODERN POLITICAL THOUGHT

2017 ◽  
Vol 60 (4) ◽  
pp. 843-863 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANNA BECKER
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
The Political ◽  
History Of Political Thought ◽  
The Public ◽  
Modern Politics ◽  
History Of ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractIn the history of early modern political thought, gender is not well established as a subject. It seems that early modern politics and its philosophical underpinnings are characterized by an exclusion of women from the political sphere. This article shows that it is indeed possible to write a gendered history of early modern political thought that transcends questions of the structural exclusion of women from political participation. Through a nuanced reading of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century commentaries on Aristotle's practical philosophy, it deconstructs notions on the public/political and private/apolitical divide and reconstructs that early modern thinkers saw the relationship of husband and wife as deeply political. The article argues that it is both necessary and possible to write gender in and into the history of political thought in a historically sound and firmly contextual way that avoids anachronisms, and it shows – as Joan Scott has suggested – that gender is indeed a ‘useful category’ in the history of political thought.

Reason of State(s) and Reasons of Church

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefania Tutino
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Moral Theology ◽  
The Political ◽  
Early Modern Europe ◽  
Natural Philosopher ◽  
Political Rivalry ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
History Of ◽  
Intellectual Context

This chapter uses the case of the French Jesuit natural philosopher and moral theologian Honoré Fabri as a lens through which we can analyze the polemical, political, ecclesiological, and theological battles between Jesuits and Jansenists that exploded in the second half of the seventeenth century, especially after the publication of Pascal’s Provincial Letters. This chapter shows that the debates on moral theology must be seen within a wider intellectual context, including the recent developments in the realm of natural philosophy, and were inextricably linked to the political history of early modern Europe, and especially to the political rivalry between France and Spain.

STOICS WHO SING: LESSONS IN CITIZENSHIP FROM EARLY MODERN LUCCA

2001 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 313-339 ◽  
Author(s):  
PETER N. MILLER
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
The Self ◽  
Roman History ◽  
The Political ◽  
Musical Culture ◽  
Political Literature ◽  
Political Ideas ◽  
Self Image ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Way

Lucca was the smallest and least important of the three Italian republics that survived the Renaissance. Venice and Genoa still command the attention of historians. But in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, for all that it might seem out-of-the-way, Lucca developed an extraordinary political literature. The regular election of senators was marked by the musical performance of a text, generally drawn from Roman history, that illustrated the way citizens of a republic were to behave. The poet and composer were natives and the event was a lesson in citizenship. A close look at the content of these serenades, or operas, makes clear that the republic's motto might have been Libertas but its teaching emphasized constantia. The themes and the heroes of Lucca's political literature were those we associate with neo-Stoicism. The relationship between neo-Stoicism and citizenship in early modern Lucca is the focus of this article. These texts present us with the self-image of an early modern republic and its understanding of what it meant to be a citizen. They are an important source for anyone interested in early modern debates about citizenship and in the political ideas that are conveyed in the commonplaces of baroque visual and musical culture.

Shakespeare and Politics in the Time of the Gunpowder Plot

2016 ◽  
Vol 78 (4) ◽  
pp. 571-588
Author(s):  
Andrew Hadfield
Keyword(s):  
Political Thought ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Language ◽  
Usual Practice ◽  
Gunpowder Plot ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractShakespeare's plays are best studied in clusters if we want to understand the political thought and preoccupations which inform their action rather than, as has been more usual practice, their generic identity. Plays written around the time of the Gunpowder Plot (1605) and the subsequent imposition of the Oath of Allegiance share common concerns regarding the swearing of oaths, honest speech, trustworthiness, and loyalty—issues that transcend distinctions between tragedies, comedies, histories and Roman Plays. I explore the relationship between political language and ideas inCoriolanusandAll's Well That Ends Well, plays that are rarely analyzed together yet which use similar language, represent related issues, and address similar anxieties. Both are part of a larger group—includingOthelloandMacbeth—which engage a contemporary audience of London citizens, representing the difficulty of life in times of acute paranoia.

Friendship, Sovereignty and Political Discord in Coriolanus

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas P. Anderson
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Critical Point ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Sovereignty ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Political Relationships ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Way ◽  
Communal Politics

This chapter re-orients the way that early modern political sovereignty is understood by arguing that the relationship between Coriolanus and Aufidius is a friendship predicated on agonism and discord. The chapter’s close examination of their alliance and eventual betrayal establishes the counter-politics of friendship that organizes political relationships explored throughout the book. A fragile warrior-friendship links the two men in shared estrangement. In claiming that the two rivals embody a singular type of friendship with resonant political implications, the chapter revises early modern theories of friendship from Erasmus, Bacon, and Montaigne, as well as friendship theory from their classical predecessors Cicero and Aristotle. Shakespeare’s depiction of amicitia perfecta offers a critical point of intervention in contemporary accounts by Foucault and Derrida of the political potential inherent in a friendship characterized by dissensus, not amity. Coriolanus stages the possibility of radicalizing the citizen/state binary, glimpsing the fragile grounds of a potentially new communal politics embodied in a fragile warrior friendship.

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