Notes on "A History of Political Theory" -- Episode 22

For episode 21, see here

The Theory of the Nation State

XXII. Radicals and Communists
 A. Radical individualism also arose in left wing popular democracy during
      civil wars.
       1. Dissolution of traditional institutions and resulting economic
           pressures were facts not theories.
       2. Individualism grounded in these facts.
 B. English civil wars mark first appearance of public opinion as important
      political factor.
 C. Levellers: radical middle-class democrats.
 D. Diggers: beginning of utopian communism, considered political reform
     superficial unless it included redress of economic inequalities.
 E. Levellers
       1. Movement started by radical soldiers of Cromwell's army concerned
           that the reforms of the revolution would be lost.
       2. Sought political equality and the end of priviledge.
       3. Connected to religious Independents. 
       4. Argued that unnust law was no law at all, even if traditional or
           common.
       5. Saw innate and unalienable rights for which legal and political 
           institutions exist only to protect.
       6. Was party of men of small property facing officers who sought 
           only moderate reform leaving power in the hands of landed
           gentry.
       7. Saw Parliament as stand in for the sovereign people.
       8. Every man had right to consent to law through his representative.
       9. Argued for representation of individuals not interests, paralleled view
           of community as a permanent reality vs. conception of nation as
           simply a mass.
       10. Levellers made natural law into a doctrine of individual rights
             (with property right as primary) .
 F. Diggers
       1. Saw natural law as a communal right to means of subsistence.
       2. Individual had only the right to share in the product of common
           land and common effort.
       3. Private property the root of evil and social abuse.
       4. Gerrard Winstanley's Law of Freedom saw in human nature two
           opposed tendencies toward:
             i. Common preservation -- the basis of commwealth
             ii. Individual preservation -- the basis of kingly government or
                government by buying and selling. 

Next week: The Republicans: Harrington, Milton and Sidney
        

      

Notes on "A History of Political Theory" -- Episode 20

For episode 19, see here

The Theory of the Nation State

XX. England: Preparation for Civil War
 A. Lines between rival political ideas not clearly drawn in early 17th Century
      England.
       1. No need to support royal absolutism with the theory of divine right.
       2. None had to seek theoretical defense for right to resist.
 B. Thomas Moore's Utopia (1516) was political satire expressing dislike of 
      growing acquisitive society.
       1. Harked back to Platonic conception of community of cooperative
           classes.
       2. Illustrated "looking back" from coming economic age.
 C. Richard Hooker argued that Puritan refusal of obedience to establish church
      was denying all political obligation.
       1. Reason was accepted universally as soon as it was understood.
       2. Law of reason was manifestly binding on all men.
       3. Man cannot satisfy all their needs in isolation and therefore form society.
       4. Ground of political obligation is common consent by which men agreed
           to be ordered by someone.
       5. Society could never withdraw its consent to authority it has set up after
           the fact.
       6. Ecclesiastical law of England not contrary to Christian faith and therefore
           binding -- as was all law -- upon all Englishmen.
 D. Calvinists and Catholics objected to royal supremacy in the Church as an 
      invasion of it's spiritual independence.
 E. Independents split church from state, seeing the former as a voluntary
     association.
 F. Erastianism of John Seldon saw the relationship between religion and the
     king in utilitarian, secularist and rational terms not common or typical
     for times.
 G. King, courts and Parliament each seen as having inherent powers, none
      claimed supremacy until the civil war.
 H. First conflict between king and courts over royal prerogative.
       1. Francis Bacon defended the right of the King to overrule the courts.
       2. Chief Justice Edward Coke argued for supremacy of common law over
           the King and Parliament.
      3. Coke saw law as indigenous growth within the realm that defined all
          rights and obligations.

Next week:  Thomas Hobbes