Term Papers on MODERN POLITICAL THOUGHT

Term Paper Title	MODERN POLITICAL THOUGHT
# of Words	1990
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	7.96

MODERN POLITICAL THOUGHT

MIDTERM

THOMAS HOBBES:  The Leviathan

          -life is simply the motions of the organism and the man is by nature a selfishly individualistic animal at constant war with all other men.
          -In a state of nature, men are equal in their self seeking and live out lives which are "nasty,solitary, brutish, and short"
          -Fear of violent death is the principle motive which causes men to create a state by contracting to surrender their natural rights and to submit to the absolute authority of the sovereign.
          -Temporal power is always superior to ecclesiastical power
          -favored a monarchy form of government
          -one of first modern western thinkers to provide a secular justification for the political state.  The philosophy of Hobbes marked ad departure in English philosophy from the religious ideas of scholasticism.
          -his ideas represented a reaction against the decentralizing ideas of the reformation which Hobbes contended brought anarchy.
          -Hobbes is regarded as an important influence on utilitarianism
          -developed his politics and ethics from a naturalistic basis of self interest.
          -held that since people are fearful and predatory they must submit to the absolute supremacy of the state, in both secular and religious matters, in order to live by reason and gain lasting preservation.
-Argued that we should not question or limit the sovereign in its power, because the state originated in a SOCIAL CONTRACT, whereby individuals accept a common superior power to protect themselves from their own brutish instincts and to make possible the satisfaction of certain human desires.
-the state is but an artificial man…sovereignty is soul, reward and punishments are nerves, peoples safety is business, equity and laws are reason and will, magistrates and officers are joints, wealth and riches are strength, and counselors are memory
          -sought to release influence on politics of theology
          -reason should rule over desire and spiritedness
          -"FEAR AND I WERE BORN TWINS"
          -believes individual  free will is absurd, world ran by physical laws and political universe, things are arranged in orderly fashion to run like clockwork
          -men are naturally equal in desires and wants, etc.
          -it is because of our aspirations that we run into conflict with each other, we are by nature competitive.
          -man want state to be strong enough to refrain us from fighting each other
          -we stay in CONTRACT for our own good
          -we can only break this contract if the state fails to protect us, unless we are killed by a foreign invader
          -opposed to division of power within government

JOHN LOCKE:  SECOND TREATISE ON GOVERNMENT

          -argued that sovereignty resided in the people for whom governments were trustees and that such governments could be legitimately overthrown if they failed to discharge their functions to the people
          -GOVERNMENT BY CONSENT OF GOVERNED
          -attacked the rationalist belief that the principles of knowledge are intuitively self-evident, arguing that all knowledge is derived from experience, either from experience of the outside world, which stamps sensations on the mind, or from internal experience, in which the mind reflects on its own activities
          -Lockes empiricism emphasizes the importance of the experience of the senses in pursuit of knowledge rather than intuitive speculation or deduction.
          -attacked the theory of the divine rights of kings and the nature of the state as conceived by Hobbes
          -argued that sovereignty did not reside in the state but with the people, and that the state is supreme, but only if it is bound by civil and what he called natural law
          -numerous ideas of Locke are apparent in U.S. constitution
          -held that revolution was not only a right but often an obligation, and he advocated a system of checks and balances in government, which was birth of three branch govt.
          -believed in religious freedom and a separation of church and state
          -Power is derived only from individuals who give up voluntarily their right to be governed
          -sovereignty resides onl...

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