POL8: The history of political thought from c.1700-c.1890 (Paper 20 of Part I of the Historical Tripos)

Paper Coordinator: Dr Thomas Hopkins

Beginning with the Enlightenment and extending from the American, French and Haitian revolutions to the wave of revolutions in 1848 and the challenge to capitalism in the thought of Karl Marx, this paper explains the formation of the fundamental concepts of modern society and politics. The line between the state and civil society, the relation between liberty and commerce, the transformations in the principles of political legitimacy which led to the notion of the modern representative republic, the political and civil status of women, the mounting challenge to slavery, the modern concept of empire: all these and more form the content of this paper.

Like POL 7, this paper offers two kinds of intellectual exploration. In Part A, you will focus on a close reading of major texts within their political and intellectual contexts. This enables you to explore how political argument was articulated in texts by the greatest political philosophers of the period. In Part B, you will focus on groups of texts which are thematically and historically connected, developing your ability to understand the way that a given political language is inflected in different directions according to different demands of national and international debate in the modern period. For those who have done other papers in the history of political thought or are thinking of taking them, this paper provides an essential introduction to the understanding of all aspects of political thought, including the foundations of modern politics in a global setting.

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