Abstract

Hobbes' theory of politics is shown to follow from his concept of philosophy. Politics is interpreted on the basis of its place in the whole of his philosophical system as developed in Elementa philosopbiae. The system itself is founded upon a methodology resulting from the attempt to guarantee certainty a priori by means of rational demonstration. According to this methodology, we can know with certainty only subjects whose genesis we know completely through constructing them. By claiming that politics is demonstrable in this way, Hobbes subsumes it under an ideal of science which is made up before human practice has been analysed. To understand politics on this basis means to deny the specificity of human practice which is dependant on the irrational contingency of circumstances. Therefore the thesis that Hobbes founds the practical philosophy of the modern age has to be corrected.