How does Spinoza’s “Democracy” differ from that of Hobbes?

2021 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 227-240
Author(s):  
Jonathan Israel
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Common Good ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
The People ◽  
Close Analysis ◽  
The Common ◽  
Natural Power ◽  
Formal Arrangement ◽  
Popular Power ◽  
Great Mass

Abstract Field focuses on the role in political theory of the concept of potentia of the people—power understood as the informal, natural power of the people—as distinct from potestas understood as the formal arrangement of power under the constitution of a given state. In a close analysis of the arguments of Hobbes and Spinoza on popular power and sovereignty, the book critiques democratic interpretations of both theories. While correct about that, the book neglects fundamental dissimilarities in their views of popular power. Of profound importance is the meaning of the concept “multitude”: unlike Hobbes, Spinoza distinguishes between the great mass of individuals and “the wise,” seeing the “multitude” as encompassing most kings. Also, there is a great gulf between their understandings of the “common good.” For Spinoza, obedience to the sovereign, Hobbes’s desideratum, is only compatible with freedom in the context of a state directed to the common good.

Rousseau's General Will: A Condorcetian Perspective

1988 ◽  
Vol 82 (2) ◽  
pp. 567-576 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernard Grofman ◽  
Scott L. Feld
Keyword(s):  
Common Good ◽  
General Will ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
The People ◽  
Collective Judgment ◽  
Jury Theorem ◽  
The Common

We identify three basic elements of Rousseau's theory of the general will: (1) there is a common good; (2) citizens are not always accurate in their judgments about what is in the common good; and (3) when citizens strive to identify the common good and vote in accordance with their perceptions of it, the vote of the Assembly of the People can be taken to be the most reliable means for ascertaining the common good. We then show that Condorcet's (1785) model of collective judgment shares these assumptions with Rousseau and that understanding the implications of Condorcet's (1785) “jury theorem” enables us to clarify many of the most obscure aspects of Rousseau's treatment of the general will, including his discussion of the debilitating effects of factions and his confidence in the ability of the Assembly of the People to discern the general will by means of voting.

The Spirit and the Subprime: Race, Risk, and Our Common Dispossession

2016 ◽  
Vol 98 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-69
Author(s):  
Amaryah Jones-Armstrong
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Common Good ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Alternative Conceptions ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
Racial Capitalism ◽  
The People ◽  
The Common

This essay argues that Sarah Coakley's understanding of contemplation and the Spirit's dispossessive work can provide timely interruption of contemporary economic crises when read beside Willie Jennings's indictment of Christianity's imagination as the production of race. Read together, contemplation and dispossession provide useful frames for analyzing and reimagining the common good. Here, I argue that theologians and church communities can understand Coakley's and Jennings's work as confrontations with racial capitalism. In particular, I take Coakley's attention to the need for dispossession by the Spirit to correspond with black theologians’ assertions that we must turn to the dispossessed in the United States—the black and brown poor—to find where God is at work. The racialized subprime debtors who are perpetually dispossessed, failing, and criminal are the people Christian theology must align with in order to confront its relation to white supremacy. By contemplating alternative conceptions of property and ownership foregrounded by the concept of dispossession, we can begin to imagine, perceive, and practice an otherwise common good.

Aristotle on the Conditions for and Limits of the Common Good

1999 ◽  
Vol 93 (3) ◽  
pp. 625-636 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas W. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Common Good ◽  
Liberal Theory ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
Political Relationships ◽  
External Goods ◽  
Political Conditions ◽  
The Common ◽  
Liberal Political Theory

Contemporary debates over liberal political theory should encourage renewed investigation of the common good, and it is appropriate to begin by interrogating Aristotle's account. Aristotle argues that injustice stands in the way of the common good. Injustice is motivated by both overgrasping for scarce external goods, such as money, honor, and power, and by excessive desires. Aristotle argues that the common good requires a reorientation away from external goods to satisfying activities that do not diminish in the sharing. He sketches an analogical account of familial and political relationships that leads us to wonder what the political conditions are for the common good. Reflecting on these conditions not only points to the strict limits of the common good but also speaks to both sides in debates over liberal theory.

Beyond the Nations: The Expansion of the Common Good in Catholic Social Thought

2001 ◽  
Vol 63 (4) ◽  
pp. 723-754 ◽  
Author(s):  
William A Barbieri
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Common Good ◽  
Social Thought ◽  
The Political ◽  
Nation State ◽  
Catholic Social Thought ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
The Common ◽  
Made In

In recent years it has become increasingly common to speak of the international or global common good. It remains unclear, however, what political content attaches to this expression, and how it relates to more traditional conceptions of the common good rooted in the context of the polis or the nation-state. This article examines the ramifications of extending this time-honored concept to a transnational framework, focusing in particular on the evolving rhetoric of the political common good in Catholic social thought. The first part traces the emergence of the transnational common good in Catholic thinkers such as Maritain, Murray, and Messner, as well as in the encyclical tradition. The second part addresses, from the standpoint of political theory, problems of scope, structure, and application attending the expansion of the common good. The concluding section proposes a multilayered, heuristic interpretation of the common good organized around the notion of a “plurality of pluralisms.”When one speaks of the common good, it always makes sense to inquire: The common good of whom? How the common good is demarcated is a matter of no small moment for any claims that are made in its name. name. For these claims stumble as soon as it becomes clear that the good referred to is in fact shared by only some members of the assumed collectivity and not the rest; and they likewise falter if they are revealed to rest on an inappropriate delimitation of the collectivity at the expense of others who, for the purposes at hand, should rightfully be included.

The Political Theory of Thomas More’s Epigrammata

Moreana ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 188-205
Author(s):  
Veronica Brooks
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Common Good ◽  
The Political ◽  
Alternative Theory ◽  
Popular Opinion ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
The Common

This essay argues that More’s Epigrammata contains a coherent political theory that is inspired by ancient Roman republicanism. More defines “liberty” as the people’s willing obedience to virtuous leaders who rule for the common good, and he claims that popular opinion is the source of legitimacy rather than divine sanction. In doing so, More critiques the Tudor regime and presents an alternative theory of kingship based on his understanding of liberty. However, More also criticizes hereditary monarchy as such and explicitly prefers a republican regime of elected men who share authority among equal peers. This republican regime more effectively promotes the common good, but it depends upon virtue in the rulers and in the citizens. More’s satirical epigrams on virtue and vice are part of his political teaching insofar as they establish his conception of citizen virtue, which supports his republicanism.

The Possibility of Self-Government

2000 ◽  
Vol 94 (3) ◽  
pp. 563-577 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin Bird
Keyword(s):  
Social Choice ◽  
Common Good ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Social Choice Theory ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
The People ◽  
The Social ◽  
Cast Doubt ◽  
Intuitive Concept ◽  
The Common

Many have suggested that the findings of social choice theory demonstrate that there can be no “will of the people.” This has subversive implications for our intuitive concept of self-government. I explore the relation between the notion of a “social will,” that of self-government, and the impossibility theorems of social choice theory. I conclude that although the concept of the social will is essential to that of self-government, the findings of social choice theory do not cast doubt upon the possibility of either. Unlike many attempts to respond to the threat posed by social choice theory, my argument does not require any appeal to the problematic notion of the common good.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Nicola Miller
Keyword(s):  
Common Good ◽  
Spanish America ◽  
Necessary Condition ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
The People ◽  
Modern Knowledge ◽  
The Common ◽  
Political Communities

This chapter introduces the term 'republic of knowledge', which conceives of knowledge as having a reality and an organisation along the lines of a republic or series of republics. It highlights sovereign states created in Spanish America that were founded on promises of enlightenment for all the people. It also illustrates the image of knowledge as a republic that alludes to a transnational ideal based on principles of openness, free exchange, absence of privilege, and a sense of the common good. The chapter traces how the republics of knowledge in this first sense of open exchange converged and overlapped with the second sense of knowledge, which is foundational to a modern republic during the wars of independence in Spanish America. It emphasizes the embrace of modern knowledge that was a founding justification for the new political communities emerging in the Americas and a necessary condition of an inspirational future.

Self-Interest and the Common Good in Elections and Referenda

2012 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 259-286
Author(s):  
Bernd J. Hartmann
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Common Good ◽  
The Common Good ◽  
The People ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
The Common ◽  
Personal Interests

This article examines the standard of decision-making that applies to voters. Are they free to follow their personal interests or are they bound to make decisions most beneficial to the common good? This question is answered not only for elections,i.e., for people choosing their representatives and for parliament itself appointing officials. Furthermore, the treatise extends to other votes as well, as it covers not only referenda as the paradigmatic means of lawmaking by the people, but also parliamentarian legislation.

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