Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) is perhaps the most important English political theorist. Potential rivals for such a title, such as John Locke, have rough counterparts in other theoretical traditions, but Hobbes may be unique. He wrote during the time of the Commonwealth and the Restoration, and his whole political theory is deeply influenced by the English Civil War. His most famous book, Leviathan, tries to present a blueprint for a social system which would be stable and minimize the dangers of anarchy and lawlessness, which Hobbes thought threatened all societies. He is one of the earliest users of the social contract approach, and its associated concept of the state of nature. His thought is very complicated, and can only be summarized at great risk of misleading, but the central point is a very deep distrust of human nature, which he held to be fixed and unchangeable. To Hobbes all men, left to themselves, were predatory, greedy, cruel and frightened of others. Thus he argues that only the toughest and most draconian of states, with supreme power (held in this model by a sovereign), can possibly hold them under control and allow the development of civilized life.
Above all he is concerned to remove all sources of competing political authority in the state. There are no rules governing what the sovereign can do to a citizen, because to have such rules would imply some qualification to the absolute duty to obey. If such a limitation existed, there would be a problem in defining who would make judgments on alleged infringements. If it were a court, that would set up a rival authority. Similarly he insists that his sovereign have the right to rule on religious truth, because to allow a church to do that might again set up challenges to authority. Although it can make dreary reading, the development of his argument is subtle and powerful, and Hobbesian ideas permeate many thinkers who would not accept the label. His intellectual commitment was to produce a true ‘science’ of politics, and he was particularly influenced by the developing mathematical sciences of his day, trying to produce a social science with the same logical certainty. There are still many puzzles about what Hobbes really meant, despite the thousands of studies written on him, and his own beliefs about religion, and the extent to which he felt men could be moral in the right circumstances, are deeply unclear. The toughness of his arguments and their often unpalatable conclusions denied him political favour in his own days, but his theories are still debated, and often seen to be relevant, especially in the study of international relations.
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