Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought

"Mary Wollstonecraft, often described as the first major feminist, is remembered principally as the author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), and there has been a tendency to view her most famous work in isolation. Yet Wollstonecraft's pronouncements about women grew out of her reflections about men, and her views on the female sex constituted an integral part of a wider moral and political critique of her times which she first fully formulated in A Vindication of the Rights of Men (1790). Written as a reply to Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution of France (1790), this is an important text in its own right as well as a necessary tool for understanding Wollstonecraft's later work. This edition brings the two texts together and also includes Hints, the notes which Wollstonecraft made towards a second, never completed, volume of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman."--BOOK JACKET.

Statism and Anarchy (Russian: Государственность и анархия, Gosudarstvennost' i anarkhiia, literally "Statehood and Anarchy") was the last work by the Russian anarchist Mikhail Bakunin. Written in the summer of 1873, the key themes of the work are the likely impact on Europe of the Franco-Prussian war and the rise of the German Empire, Bakunin's view of the weaknesses of the Marxist position and an affirmation of anarchism. Statism and Anarchy was the only one of Bakunin's major anarchist works to be written in Russian and was primarily aimed at a Russian audience, with an initial print run of 1,200 copies printed in Switzerland and smuggled into Russia. (Source: [Wikipedia](

"This volume provides a broad representative selection of King James's writings on a range of secular and religious topics. Each text is provided in full, creating an invaluable reference tool for 16th and 17th century scholars working in different disciplines and a fascinating collection for students and general readers interested in early modern history and literature. In contrast to other editions of James's writings, which have been confined to a single aspect of his work, the present edition brings together for the first time his poetry and his religious writing, his political works and his treatises on witchcraft and tobacco, in a single volume." "What makes this collection of James's writings especially significant is the distinctiveness of his position as both writer and ruler, an author of incontestable authority. All his authorly roles, as poet, polemicist, theologian, political theorist and political orator are informed by this fact. James's writings were also inevitably influenced by the circumstances of his reigns and this volume reflects the turbulent issues of religion, politics and nationhood that troubled his three kingdoms."--Jacket.

A comprehensive anthology of Rousseau's work containing The Social Contract, his most famous single work. --Publisher

This book is a translation of a classic work of modern social and political thought. Elements of the Philosophy of Right, Hegel's last major published work, is an attempt to systematize ethical theory, natural right, the philosophy of law, political theory, and the sociology of the modern state into the framework of Hegel's philosophy of history. Hegel's work has been interpreted in radically different ways, influencing many political movements from far right to far left, and is widely perceived as central to the communitarian tradition in modern ethical, social, and political thought. This edition includes extensive editorial material informing the reader of the historical background of Hegel's text, and explaining his allusions to Roman law and other sources, making use of lecture materials which have only recently become available. The new translation is literal, readable, and consistent, and will be informative and scholarly enough to serve the needs of students and specialists alike.

First published in 1869, this celebrated work of social criticism is the reference-point for all discussion of the relations between politics and culture.

Discusses the education and behavior appropriate for princes, nobility and common people, so that all classes can understand their responsibilities towards society as a whole.

De Cive (On the Citizen) is the first full exposition of the political thought of Thomas Hobbes, the greatest English political philosopher. Professors Tuck and Silverthorne have undertaken the first complete translation since 1651, a rendition long thought (in error) to have been at least sanctioned by Hobbes himself. This new translation is both accurate and accessible: it is accompanied by a full glossary of Latin terms, a chronology, a bibliography and an expository introduction. Throughout, the editors have emphasized consistency in the translation and usage of Hobbes's basic conceptual vocabulary, respecting Hobbes's own concern for accurate definition of terms.

"Ferdinand Tonnies's Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft (first published in 1887) is a classic of social and political theory in the later-modern period. It focuses on the universally endemic clash between small-scale, kinship and neighbourhood-based 'communities' and large-scale competitive market 'societies'. This theme is explored in all aspects of life - in political, economic, legal and family structures; in art, religion and culture; in constructions of 'selfhood' and 'personhood'; and in modes of cognition, language and human understanding. Tonnies is best known as one of the 'founding fathers' of modern sociology, but the present work lays greater emphasis on his relationship to European political thought and to developments in philosophy since the seventeeth-century scientific revolution, particularly the legacies of Hobbes and Kant. It can be read at many different levels: as a response to developments in Bismarckian Germany; as a more general critique of the culture of modernity; as a theoretical exercise in social, political and moral science; and as an unusual commentary on the inner character of 'democratic socialism'. This new translation and introduction make Tonnies's classic but difficult work accessible to English-speaking readers interested in social and political theory, intellectual and social history, language and cultural studies, and the history of economic thought."--Jacket.

"Moses Hess is a major figure in the development of both early communist and Zionist thought. The Holy History of Mankind appeared in 1837, and was the first book-length socialist tract to appear in Germany, representing an unusual synthesis of Judaism and Christianity that showed the considerable influence upon Hess of Spinoza, Herder and Hegel. In due course many of Hess' ideas would find their way into the work of Karl Marx, and into subsequent socialist thought. The distinguished political scientist Shlomo Avineri provides the first full English translation of this text; along with new renditions of Socialism and Communism, A Communist Credo and The Consequences of a Revolution of the Proletariat. All of the usual reader-friendly series features are provided, including a chronology, concise introduction and notes for further reading, in a work of special relevance to students of politics, modern European history, socialism and the history of Zionism."--BOOK JACKET.

This remarkable expression of radical republican thought has never before been published. Algernon Sidney was among the most unrelenting partisans of the parliamentary party during the Commonwealth, and died on the scaffold in 1683 for his opposition to Charles II. Sidney's voluminous Discourses Concerning Government was published after his death, but the earlier and more vivid Court Maxims was only recently rediscovered in a manuscript in Warwick Castle. Written during Sidney's continental exile, Court Maxims is of the greatest importance for the study of the international ramifications of seventeenth-century republican thought. Its dialogue structure presents a lively discussion about the principles of government and the practice of politics, articulating a vital tradition of republicanism in an age of absolutism. These characteristics make Court Maxims a unique text, essential reading for anyone interested in republicanism or early modern political thought.

"Pierre Bayle was one of the most important sceptical thinkers of the seventeenth century. His work was a major influence on the development of the ideas of Voltaire, Hume, Montesquieu and Rousseau. Sally L. Jenkinson's new edition presents the reader with a coherent path through Bayle's monumental work. This is the first volume in English to select political writings from Bayle's work and to present its author as a specifically political thinker. Sally L. Jenkinson's translation will be welcomed by scholars and students of the history of ideas, political theory, cultural history and French studies."--Jacket.

"Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, published a wide variety of works including poems, plays, letters, and treatises of natural philosophy, but her significance as a political writer has only recently been recognised. This major contribution to the series of Cambridge Texts includes the first ever modern edition of her Divers Orations on English social and political life, together with a new student-friendly rendition of her imaginary voyage, A New World called the Blazing World. Susan James explains the allusions made in this classic text, and directs readers to the many intellectual debates with which Cavendish engages. Together these two works reveal the character and scope of Margaret Cavendish's political thought. She emerges as a singular and probing writer, who simultaneously upholds a conservative social and political order and destabilises it through her critical and unresolved observations about natural philosophy, scientific institutions, religion, and the relations between men and women."--Jacket.

The First New Science gives a clear account of Vico's mature philosophy: the belief that certain functions which are necessary for the maintenance of human society and culture, including philosophy, also condition them historically. This challenges the traditional view that philosophy can lay claim to an historically independent viewpoint, thus bringing into question the legitimacy of the claims of universal prescriptive political theories as against the de facto political beliefs of particular historical societies. This is the first of Vico's later major books in which he wrote in Italian in order not merely to expound but to demonstrate in practice, his conception of the philosophical importance of etymology. This 2002 Cambridge Texts edition is the first complete English translation of the 1725 text. Accompanied by a glossary, bibliography, chronology of Vico's life and expository introduction, it makes this important work accessible to students for the first time.

The key writings of the author of the Declaration of Independence are presented here in a clear and accessible format. The texts are supported by a concise introduction, suggestions for further reading and short biographies.

James Harrington's brief career as a political and historical theorist spans the last years of the Cromwellian Protectorate and the Restoration of 1660. This volume comprises the first and last of Harrington's writings. Harrington was the first theorist to interpret the English Civil Wars as a revolution, the result of a longterm process of social change that led to the decay of the old political order. Professor Pocock's lucid introduction emphasizes Harrington's place as a pivotal figure in the history of English political thought. This edition also contains a chronology of principal events in Harrington's life and a guide to further reading.

This new collection of Aristotle's political writings provides the student with all the necessary materials for a full understanding of his work as a political scientist, and places it in the context of his ethical theory and science of nature. Not only does the introduction offer an unusually lucid and accessible account of The Politics, it also shows the relation between this and his studies as a constitutional historian. The Constitution of Athens is the only one of the many Constitutions produced by Aristotle's school to have survived, and this is now presented here alongside The Politics so that the student can appreciate both the empirical and the theoretical aspects of Aristotelian political science. In addition to a revised and extended introduction, this expanded Cambridge Texts edition contains an extensive guide to further reading, an index of names with biographical notes, and a glossary for The Constitution of Athens. Presentation of The Politics and The Constitution of Athens in a single volume (together with the final chapter of the Nicomachean Ethics) will make this the most attractive and convenient student edition of these seminal works currently available.