The aim of the book is to introduce the reader to Plato's political philosophy. The book is directed towards an audience that approaches Plato for the first time. In Plato politics cannot be dissociated from ethics, metaphysics and epistemology. One cannot fully appreciate Plato’s 'ideal state’ without understanding Plato’s Theory of Forms and his conception of the soul. For this reason the purpose of the book is to place Plato’s political philosophy within Plato’s philosophy as a whole. The book mainly (...) focuses on Plato’s Republic, but also discusses the Statesman and the Laws. Where necessary and in order to explicate main Platonic doctrines, reference is also made to other Platonic dialogues. The purpose of the book is to serve as a guide to Plato’s political dialogues. (shrink)

his article makes a case for intersubjective recognition in Hegel by examining the idea of a 'struggle for recognition' in the Phenomenology of Spirit. Challenging the argument by several scholars that Hegel eventually came to compromise his initial interest in intersubjectivity, it argues instead that Hegel allots a central place to the idea of a 'struggle for recognition' at least in the Phenomenology of 1807. To substantiate this thesis, Hegel's phenomenological exegesis of 'Conscience. The 'beautiful soul', evil and its forgiveness' (...) is reconstructed in terms of a 'struggle for recognition'. The final section questions the further claim of some of these critics that Hegel's thought came to rest on a metaphysical concept of an Absolute Spirit, which ultimately undermines interpersonal relationships. (shrink)

This collection examines different themes and offers novel interpretations of Hegel's political philosophy. Thus, it sheds new light on what has been perhaps the most controversial area of Hegelian scholarship. It includes eight essays by a group of international scholars at different stages of their career. Its distinctive contribution is that it explores both Hegel's early and mature political philosophy. It includes a paper on Hegel's early essay on "Natural Law", published in two instalments in 1802 and 1803, and the (...) System of Ethical Life, also published in 1802-1803, as well as papers on Hegel's Philosophy of Right (published in 1821). Two papers also discuss "The German Constitution", written between 1798 and 1802. The volume comes as an addition to the current debate that has been occasioned by the bicentenary of Hegel's Philosophy of Right. (shrink)

This book offers a distinctive interpretation of Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. It suggests that Hegel's approach in the 1807 Phenomenology is akin to Socratic 'midwifery'. The book starts from the midwife figure in Plato's dialogue Theaetetus. There Socrates elicits from Theaetetus his views on the nature of knowledge, without imposing on him his own ideas thereof. Similarly, in the 1807 Phenomenology Hegel elicits a series of shapes of consciousness and spirit, and uncovers the implications of each one of them. In (...) the same way as Socrates subjected in his interlocutor's views to an internal criticism to see whether they were valid or not, Hegel subjects the various 'shapes of consciousness' to an immanent critique, in the course of which each oneof them proves to be inadequate on its own terms. Like the Platonic dialogue Theaetetus, Hegel's Phenomenology does not end in a positive doctrine. So the Phenomenology of Spirit introduces us to philosophical science in a negative sense, that is, by showing what philosophical science is not. In this way it prepares the ground for science proper, namely, Hegel's Science of Logic. (shrink)

"Evangelia Sembou's book offers a concise introduction to the main ideas and arguments of the major political thinkers of modernity. It considers the following key thinkers: Hobbes, Locke, Bentham, J.S. Mill, Rousseau, Burke, Hegel and Marx" (4ème de couv.).