Politics, Language, and Time: Essays on Political Thought and History / Edition 2

by J. G. A. Pocock

Overview

In his first essay, "Languages and Their Implications," J. G. A. Pocock announces the emergence of the history of political thought as a discipline apart from political philosophy. Traditionally, "history" of political thought has meant a chronological ordering of intellectual systems without attention to political languages; but it is through the study of those languages and of their changes, Pocock claims, that political thought will at last be studied historically.

Pocock argues that the solution has already been approached by, first, the linguistic philosophers, with their emphasis on the importance of language study to understanding human thought, and, second, by Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, with its notion of controlling intellectual paradigms. Those paradigms within and through which the scientist organizes his intellectual enterprise may well be seen as analogous to the worlds of political discourse in which political problems are posed and political solutions are proffered. Using this notion of successive paradigms, Pocock demonstrates its effectiveness by analyzing a wide range of subjects, from ancient Chinese philosophy to Machiavelli, Hobbes, and Burke.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780226671390
Publisher:	University of Chicago Press
Publication date:	01/15/1989
Edition description:	1
Pages:	299
Product dimensions:	5.25(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

J. G. A. Pocock is the Harry C. Black Professor of History at the Johns Hopkins University. Among his many books are The Ancient Constitution and the Federal Law and Virtue, Commerce, and History.

Table of Contents

Preface, 1989
1. Languages and Their Implications: The Transformation of the Study of Political Thought
2. Ritual, Language, Power: An Essay on the Apparent Political Meanings of Ancient Chinese Philosophy
3. Civic Humanism and Its Role in Anglo-American Thought
4. Machiavelli, Harrington and English Political Ideologies in the Eighteenth Century
5. Time, History and Eschatology in the Thought of Thomas Hobbes
6. Burke and the Ancient Constitution: A Problem in the History of Ideas
7. Time, Institutions and Action: An Essay on Traditions and Their Understanding
8. On the Non-Revolutionary Character of Paradigms: A Self-Criticism and Afterpiece

Editorial Reviews

A reprint of the edition published in 1971, Atheneum (the original appeared in 1960). Collects eight essays (six of which appeared elsewhere during the 60s) in which Pocock (history, Johns Hopkins) announces the emergence of the history of political thought as a discipline apart from philosophy. Political thought, he shows, has been separated from its rightful context and analyzed only for its philosophical content. Reclaiming this discipline for history requires attention to the changing Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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