English Political Theory in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries

2012 ◽  
pp. 410-426
Author(s):  
David Weinstein
Author(s):  
Raphaël Ingelbien ◽  
Susan Galavan

The introduction reviews various influential definitions of authority in political theory and sociology. It then tests their applicability to manifestations of authority in nineteenth-century Ireland, which bore a more complicated relationship to modernity than many of the societies where the nature or the very existence of authority is said to have shifted decisively in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It makes a case for the usefulness of a concept that has so far been less widely invoked in Irish historiography than related concepts like power and hegemony. Through an overview of the different chapters that make up the collection, it draws out themes that emerge across various contributions, relates them to the volume’s broader theoretical and historiographical frameworks, and suggests ways in which analyses of authority in nineteenth-century Ireland can prove relevant for discussions of more recent Irish history and of twenty-first transformations of authority in the wider world.


Author(s):  
Dennis Dalton

The long tradition of Hindu philosophy in India had several distinct peaks of systematic thought. The apogee of its political theory developed during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as a response to the British imperial authority, commonly known as the Raj. This article describes modern Hindu political philosophy's admixture of its classical tradition with contemporary Indian nationalism as it encountered British theories of freedom, equality, power, and social or political change. The result was an original and cogent system of ideas that at once responded to the British intellectual challenge and reconstituted key elements of the classical Indian philosophical tradition. The leading formulators of this formidable project were four major Hindu theorists: Swami Vivekananda, Aurobindo Ghose, Rabindranath Tagore, and Mohandas K. Gandhi. These four are intricately connected by a logical nexus of concepts derived from their common religion, their interpretative intellectual project of reforming Hinduism in the face of British colonialism, and their significant commitment to the cause of Indian independence.


1949 ◽  
Vol 43 (02) ◽  
pp. 399-402
Author(s):  
Harold F. Gosnell
Keyword(s):  

Author(s):  
Ruth Kinna

This book is designed to remove Peter Kropotkin from the framework of classical anarchism. By focusing attention on his theory of mutual aid, it argues that the classical framing distorts Kropotkin's political theory by associating it with a narrowly positivistic conception of science, a naively optimistic idea of human nature and a millenarian idea of revolution. Kropotkin's abiding concern with Russian revolutionary politics is the lens for this analysis. The argument is that his engagement with nihilism shaped his conception of science and that his expeditions in Siberia underpinned an approach to social analysis that was rooted in geography. Looking at Kropotkin's relationship with Elisée Reclus and Erico Malatesta and examining his critical appreciation of P-J. Proudhon, Michael Bakunin and Max Stirner, the study shows how he understood anarchist traditions and reveals the special character of his anarchist communism. His idea of the state as a colonising process and his contention that exploitation and oppression operate in global contexts is a key feature of this. Kropotkin's views about the role of theory in revolutionary practice show how he developed this critique of the state and capitalism to advance an idea of political change that combined the building of non-state alternatives through direct action and wilful disobedience. Against critics who argue that Kropotkin betrayed these principles in 1914, the book suggests that this controversial decision was consistent with his anarchism and that it reflected his judgment about the prospects of anarchistic revolution in Russia.


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