Overview

The history of the last two hundred years is a story of the immense and relentless growth of the State at the expense of other social institutions. We are now so familiar and accepting of the State's pre-eminence in all things, that few think to question it, and most suppose that democratic endorsement legitimizes it. The aim of this essay is to present a sustained and compelling argument against both presumptions. It contends that the gross imbalance of power in the modern State between ruler and ruled is sorely in need of justification, and that democracy simply masks this need with an illusion of popular sovereignty. Although this is an essay in cultural criticism whose argument should be fully accessible to the general reader, it is written from within the European tradition of political philosophy from Plato to Rawls. Gordon Graham is Regius Professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Aberdeen and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

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Introduction Chapter 1 Leviathan The Definition of the State Limited, Unlimited and Totalitarian States Law, Trust and Social Co-ordination Estimating the Benefits of Statehood General Good versus Individual Advantage Chapter 2 Politics and Reason Plato's Challenge Politics, Knowledge and Desire The Paradox of Democracy Direct versus Representative Democracy Chapter 3 Majority Rule Universal Suffrage and the Problem of Inclusion Political Competence Testing Democratic Consent Elective Dictatorship and the Tyranny of the Majority Liberal Democracy Chapter 4 The Illusion of Power Political Participation Power to the People The General Will Chapter 5 The Politics of Salvation The Crisis of Modernity Marxism and the Transformation of Society The Neutral State Politics as Management Chapter 6 Alternatives to Democracy Republicanism Civil Society Political Theory and Political Practice Select Bibliography

Author Information

Gordon Graham is Regius Professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Aberdeen and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

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