Overview

Violence and war were ubiquitous features of politics long before the emergence of the modern state system. Since the 1780s revolutions and terrorism have also challenged the idea of the state as a final arbiter of international order. This book covers ten major theorists of politics, violence and relations between states - Thucydides, Augustine, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Clausewitz, Lenin and Mao, and Schmitt. Each thinker is considered in detail, not just as a placeholder in 'realist' versus moralism debates. Conflict, war and revolution are generally seen in political thought as problems to be managed by stable domestic political communities. In different ways, all the paradigmatic thinkers here see them as inevitable dimensions of human experience, while yet manifested in different logics of acting politically and requiring different ways of handling. This book dramatically broadens the canon of political thought by considering perspectives on the international system that challenge its historical inevitability and triumph.

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9781909890725

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Paul Kelly is Professor of Political Theory at the London School of Economics and a former Pro-Director of LSE. He is the author and editor of sixteen books and edited collections and published numerous scholarly articles. His interests range across political theory and philosophy and the history of thought. He has edited and co-edited the journals Utilitas and Political Studies and cofounded Political Studies Review. His most recent books are Political Thinkers (with David Boucher, Oxford 2017) and he is currently working on a book entitled Against Post Liberalism for Polity Press.

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