How to Think Politically

Thinker DatesIntroduction: Politics - Might Made RightANCIENTS1 Confucius: The Sage2 Plato: The Dramatist3 Aristotle: The Biologist4 Augustine: The RealistMEDIEVALS5 Al-Farabi: The Imam6 Maimonides: The Lawgiver7 Thomas Aquinas: The HarmonizerMODERNS8 Niccolò Machiavelli: The Patrio9 Thomas Hobbes: The Absolutist10 John Locke: The Puritan11 David Hume: The Sceptic12 Jean-Jacques Rousseau: The Citizen13 Edmund Burke: The Counter-Revolutionary14 Mary Wollstonecroft: The Feminist15 Immanuel Kant: The Purist16 Thomas Paine: The Firebrand17 Georg Wilhelm Freidrich Hegel: The Mystic18 James Madison: The Founder19 Alexis de Tocqueville: The Prophet20 John Stuart Mill: The Individualist21 Karl Marx: The Revolutionary22 Friedrich Nietsche: The PsychologistCONTEMPORARIES23 Mohandas Gandhi: The Warrior24 Sayyid Qutb: The Jihadist25 Hannah Arendt: The Pariah26 Mao Zedong: The Chairman27 Friedrich Hayek: The Libertairan28 John Rawls: The Liberal29 Martha Nussbaum: The Self-Developer30 Arne Naess: The MountaineerConclusion: The Unhappy Marriage of Politics and PhilosophySuggested Further ReadingAcknowledgementsIndex

James Bernard Murphy is Professor of Government at Dartmouth College, where he teaches political philosophy, jurisprudence, and ethics. Before becoming a professor, Murphy worked as an urban planner in the City of New York, where he was born. He received his Masters of City Planning from M.I.T. and his B.A. and Ph.D. from Yale University. Murphy's scholarly books include The Moral Economy of Labor (1993), Your Whole Life: Beyond Childhood and Adulthood (2020), and Deification in Classical Greek Philosophy and the Bible (forthcoming 2024). He has also written for a wider audience in his books How to Think Politically (with Graeme Garrard, 2019), Haunted by Paradise: A Philosopher's Quest for Biblical Answers to Key Moral Questions (2021), The Third Sword: On the Political Role of Prophets (forthcoming, 2023), and in essays for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post. Graeme Garrard is the author of four books, most recently The Return of the State: And Why It Is Essential For Our Health, Wealth and Happiness (Yale University Press, 2022). He has published many scholarly journal articles and popular essays in newspapers and magazines. Dr Garrard is Professor of Politics at Cardiff University and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. He has taught at colleges and universities in Canada, Britain, France and the United States for 27 years, including 12 years at the Harvard Summer School. He is a graduate of the University of Toronto and Oxford University.

A wonderful introduction to history's most influential scribblers, filled with clear explanations and engaging detail. Steven Pinker, author of 'Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress'