scholarly journals “Advisor Literature” and Russian Political Thought in the Enlightenment: The Anti-Machiavellian Influence

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Konstantin Bugrov
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Christian Morality ◽  
Effective System ◽  
The Status ◽  
Practical Guidelines

This article studies the role of the anti-Machiavellian vision of politics in the development of political thought in westernising eighteenth-century Russia. The author disputes S. Whittaker’s idea that the images of good and bad monarchs in eighteenth-century Russian “advisor literature” (rooted in the tradition of “princely mirrors”) served as a kind of political programme which the ruler was to follow (i. e. imitate good models and avoid bad ones). In “advisor literature”, one can distinguish a descriptive component, which, using the image of ideal monarchs, consolidated the status quo in the minds of subjects, and “advice” proper, suggesting a situation with several competing solutions. This type of advice was available in various spheres of state administration, including the political life of the court itself. Tracing the transformation of the genre of “princely mirrors” in Europe makes it possible to identify and understand the political implications in its Russian counterpart. Being challenged by Machiavelli, who replaced Christian ethics in politics with an immoral “state interest”, sixteenth- and seventeenth-century European intellectuals produced a set of anti-Machiavellian ideas to incorporate the Machiavellian idea of political efficiency into Christian morality, prove that the most effective system of behaviour was following the ethical norms of Christianity, and develop some practical guidelines for success at court. In the eighteenth century, a number of anti-Machiavellian writings from previous centuries were translated into Russian (circulated as manuscripts and published works) and were in demand among the intellectual elite. Therefore, researchers have to consider the anti-Machiavellian influence on Russian political culture in the Enlightenment, particularly in the development of ideas about the relationship between politics and morality and the status of politicians.

Reason, Self-Legislation and Legitimacy: Conceptions of Freedom in the Political Thought of Rousseau and Kant

1997 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Kaufman
Keyword(s):  
Practical Reason ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
Theories Of Justice ◽  
Great Generality ◽  
The Status

Rousseau and Kant both argue for contractarian theories of justice. In spite of their common contractarianism, however, Rousseau and Kant argue for conceptions of legitimacy which differ markedly. The substantive differences between their accounts of legitimacy, I suggest, illustrate the political implications of disagreement regarding the status of practical reason. Rousseau, in assigning reason to a merely instrumental status, anticipates both postmodern and empiricist skepticism regarding the power of reason to ground the choice of ends. Kant is the forerunner of contemporary accounts of justice which reject such skeptical views of practical reason. Rousseau's skepticism about practical reason ties his criterion of legitimacy directly to the actual preferences of individuals. Kant's more robust conception of practical reason (1) allows him to argue for a criterion of great generality and flexibility, but (2) ties the plausibility of his account of legitimacy directly to the soundness of his conception of practical reason.

Women in Power and Decision making Positions : Conditions and Restraints

1970 ◽  
pp. 53-57
Author(s):  
Azza Charara Baydoun
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Political Participation ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
Decision Making Process ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Policies And Procedures ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Status ◽  
Slow Progress

Women today are considered to be outside the political and administrative power structures and their participation in the decision-making process is non-existent. As far as their participation in the political life is concerned they are still on the margins. The existence of patriarchal society in Lebanon as well as the absence of governmental policies and procedures that aim at helping women and enhancing their political participation has made it very difficult for women to be accepted as leaders and to be granted votes in elections (UNIFEM, 2002).This above quote is taken from a report that was prepared to assess the progress made regarding the status of Lebanese women both on the social and governmental levels in light of the Beijing Platform for Action – the name given to the provisions of the Fourth Conference on Women held in Beijing in 1995. The above quote describes the slow progress achieved by Lebanese women in view of the ambitious goal that requires that the proportion of women occupying administrative or political positions in Lebanon should reach 30 percent of thetotal by the year 2005!

scholarly journals Narrating technonatures: discourses of biotechnology in a neoliberal era

2018 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 186
Author(s):  
Myles Carroll
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
The Political ◽  
Effective Strategy ◽  
Economic Implications ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
The Status ◽  
Political Economic

This article considers the role played by discourses of nature in structuring the cultural politics of anti-GMO activism. It argues that such discourses have been successful rhetorical tools for activists because they mobilize widely resonant nature-culture dualisms that separate the natural and human worlds. However, these discourses hold dubious political implications. In valorizing the natural as a source of essential truth, natural purity discourses fail to challenge how naturalizations have been used to legitimize sexist, racist and colonial systems of injustice and oppression. Rather, they revitalize the discursive purchase of appeals to nature as a justification for the status quo, indirectly reinforcing existing power relations. Moreover, these discourses fail to challenge the critical though contingent reality of GMOs' location within the wider framework of neoliberal social relations. Fortunately, appeals to natural purity have not been the only effective strategy for opposing GMOs. Activist campaigns that directly target the political economic implications of GMOs within the context of neoliberalism have also had successes without resorting to appeals to the purity of nature. The successes of these campaigns suggest that while nature-culture dualisms remain politically effective normative groundings, concerns over equity, farmers' rights, and democracy retain potential as ideological terrains in the struggle for social justice.

scholarly journals Ethnographic Memories

1969 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-18
Author(s):  
Maxime Polleri
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Production ◽  
Personal Knowledge ◽  
The Political ◽  
Historical Account ◽  
Politics Of Knowledge ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
History Of

This article explores the similarities between a memoir and an ethnographic work. A memoir stands as an historical account written from personal knowledge. It is a form of writing that should resonate deeply within the heart of the anthropologist, whose very own specificity is to be, first and foremost, an ethnographer. That is, anthropologists are individuals full of (hi) stories, contingence, and subjectivity, who nevertheless struggle to bring “objective” accounts of what had happened under their eyes during fieldwork. I use this short comparative act as a jumping board to examine the politics of knowledge in the history of anthropological inquiry since the Enlightenment. More precisely, this comparison represents an opportunity to look at what is silently invested in the practices of ethnographical writing. In a brief discussion, I highlight the political implications that surround issues of knowledge production, expert voices, and translation amidst the discourse and narrative of anthropologists.

The Luso-Brazilian Enlightenment: Between Reform and Revolution

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alice Soares Guimarães
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
The Political ◽  
Roman Catholicism ◽  
Absolute Power ◽  
Portuguese Empire ◽  
Political Debates ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Political Form

This chapter examines transformations of state–society relations in eighteenth-century Portugal in relation to Enlightened political debates of the time. It also explores how these transformations shaped the relations between Portugal and Brazil in the nineteenth century, the debate about the political form of independent Brazil, and the intra-Brazilian struggles over this form before and after independence. More importantly, it challenges the notion that the Enlightenment was absent from the Portuguese Empire as a result of the rejection of modern ideas by conservative world views and projects. It argues that there was a Luso-Brazilian Enlightenment that was plural and eclectic, supporting both critiques and defences of the absolute power of the king, endorsing simultaneously a secularisation process, the promotion of reason and Roman Catholicism, and fostering not only revolutionary projects but also conservative state reforms.

Calvinists, Arminians, Socinians: Popular Sovereignty and Natural Rights in Early Modern Political Thought

2019 ◽  
pp. 21-35
Author(s):  
James Moore
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
John Locke ◽  
Natural Rights ◽  
Popular Sovereignty ◽  
The Political ◽  
Reformed Church ◽  
Hugo Grotius

This chapter focuses upon natural rights in the writings of Hugo Grotius, the Levellers and John Locke and the manner in which their understanding of rights was informed by distinctive Protestant theologies: by Arminianism or the theology of the Remonstrant Church and by Socinianism. The chapter argues that their theological principles and the natural rights theories that followed from those principles were in conflict with the theology of Calvin and the theologians of the Reformed church. The political theory that marks the distinctive contribution of Calvin and the Reformed to political theory was the idea of popular sovereignty, an idea revived in the eighteenth century, in the political writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

The Personnel of the Dublin Society of United Irishmen, 1791-4

1940 ◽  
Vol 2 (5) ◽  
pp. 12-53
Author(s):  
R. B. McDowell
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Political Power ◽  
Political Freedom ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Independent Voters ◽  
United Irishmen

One of the most noticeable features of Irish political life in the 'later eighteenth century, is, that though political power was :oncentrated in comparatively few hands, there was a very large leasure of political freedom. One could in fact sum up the system by saying that it was oligarchy tempered by discussion. As a result, voluntary and unofficial societies and clubs arose for the purpose of educating and influencing public opinion, and were the nuclei of much political thought and action. There [were Whig Clubs, Constitutional Clubs, Societies for the [Preservation of Liberty and Peace and Associations of Independent Voters. Thus there was nothing very strange in the Iformation, in November 1791, of a Dublin branch of the newly bounded Society of United Irishmen. But this group was to prove unique in at least one respect.

THE EVOLUTION OF THE PROFESSIONAL ADMINISTRATOR’S STATUS IN MEDIEVAL RUSSIA ON AN EXAMPLE OF THE BOYAR DUMA

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 2-9
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Status ◽  
Historical Practice

The article is about the evolution of the status of the Boyar Duma in Russia during the six centuries from X to XV. The role of boyars in the political life of the country has changed with the development of the role of the Prince´s administration and overcoming feudal disunity. Boyars´ management in real historical practice was ineffective. But this fact has become an important factor in the formation of national political culture.

scholarly journals Within the heart’s darkness: The role of emotions in Arendt’s political thought

2016 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 153-173 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dan Degerman
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
The Relationship

Interest in the political relevance of the emotions is growing rapidly. In light of this, Hannah Arendt’s claim that the emotions are apolitical has come under renewed fire. But many critics have misunderstood her views on the relationship between individuals, emotions and the political. This paper addresses this issue by reconstructing the conceptual framework through which Arendt understands the emotions. Arendt often describes the heart – where the emotions reside – as a place of darkness. I begin by tracing this metaphor through her work to demonstrate that it is meant to convey the inherently uncertain nature of emotions rather than a devaluation of them. I proceed to challenge the notion that Arendt adopts the Enlightenment dichotomy between reason and emotion. In fact, she rejects both as a basis for politics. However, she does identify some constructive roles for the emotions. I argue that fear is intrinsically connected to courage – the principal political virtue – in Arendt’s philosophy. In light of my discussion, I then reinterpret the role of compassion and pity in On Revolution, concluding that Arendt’s insights can help us avoid the potential pitfalls of the contemporary project to recuperate the emotions in politics.

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