The three essays that compose this work were to be presented as lectures at Cambridge in 1975. Because of Plamenatz’s death, however, this did not occur and they were only published in 2012. Plamenatz presents Machiavelli as both a moralist and a political realist. His insistence that the term ‘virtu’ carries both moral and nonmoral connotations without implying a negative double standard for politics is compelling, though of course not original. He notes that today we employ both senses when talking (...) about politicians, the latter being equivalent to successful statecraft. The difference between Machiavelli and us, he claims, is less one of substance than style. Plamenatz’s treatment of Hobbes .. (shrink)

Most people believe the political and legal theory of Adam Smith to be grounded in the ultimacy of possessive individualism. It is conventional wisdom that the author of the Wealth of Nations sees man as a rational interest maximizer, and society as a network of market relations. It is further assumed that Smith, anticipating Bentham, is a thorough-going utilitarian and that one of his main contributions to social thought is his reduction of politics to public administration and its subordination to (...) economics. Haakonssen in the course of this closely reasoned work effectively and convincingly refutes each and every one of these false truisms. Of course to those familiar with current revisionist accounts of eighteenth century thought this in itself will appear neither shocking nor novel. However, in Haakonssen's comparative analysis of Smith's and Hume's theories of justice the developing critique of the still dominant picture of Smith is given detailed textual support. (shrink)