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Summary Social and Political Philosophy
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MINOR PHILOSOPHY --- a (short) summary of the mandatory introduction text by T. Stahl, chapters 1 and 2. Written in English. (Possibly contains some grammatical errors)
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Social and Political Philosophy – notes on “An Introduction toPolitical History – Titus Stahl”
Chapter 1: Political Philosophy and Politics
Definittions of politics
‘Political philosophy’ means to “reflect philosophically about issues having to do with those
parts of life we call political.”
Questions and topics that suit political philosophy are:
what is the best way to live together?
guidance in understanding politics
developing normative principles
prescriptive nature
reconstructing theories
Politics can be defined by:
a) an institutional setting or a way of action
b) cooperative or conflictual
The traditional conception of politics, according to Wolff, concerns the state or government
and is institutional.
Weber defines politics not as a government, but as a political community. This political
community has:
1. collective action
2. domination over people within territory
3. is necessarily and readily coercive.
With dominiation is meant that the people obey the commands of the government. This
domination is used to reach goals, and as a last resort, legitimate force can be used to
reinforce those commands.
Another aspect of a political community according to Weber is that the government schould at
least appear to be legitimate. In modern governments it’s thought that they are morally
entitled to domination.
The ‘sovereign’ has monopoly of violence in his/her ruled territory. They also make rules for
institutions, without being ruled by an institution themselves.
The traditional definition of politics:
- power to set ultimate rules
- legitimate, or at least recognised as such
- monopoly of violence
- willing to use coercive force
This definition is still lacking. There are of course other political dimensions that have
nothing to do with government per se, like protests and certain movements. Still, those are
considered political.
, The political versus the private – Aristotle
Aristotle wrote about the ‘private sphere’. The private sphere could be understood from the
concept of the household, oikos, and the polis.
Oikos The state
- makes it possible to live - makes it possible to live well and
freely
- subjected people , unfree and - the ‘subjected’ are as free and as
unreasonable reasonable as the rulers are
The oikos used to be the example for the state. It was believed that the ruler should take his
authorotive position like the head of the household did over his family and slaves.
Aristotle thought that this was a wrong comparison, because citizens should not be treated like
women and slaves. This conception is now seen as sexist and patriarchal.
The political versus the social – Hannah Arendt
Arendt wrote about a ‘public sphere’, a place where people could act and speek freely in a
political way.
In this public sphere, you can:
a) take action: stand up for something publicly
b) speech: public endorsement of your position or argument to give interpretation to your
action.
Action and speech are the access to the public sphere. It’s what she calls a ‘mode of human
community’.
The public sphere is needed to become a political being, to make ourselves appear and discuss
questions.
Some ‘rules’ for politics:
- when or if a state uses violence, it is not political. In other words, violence does not
belong to or is not necessarily part of politics, because if the government really has
power, it should not need violence.
- Violence tears down the public sphere
- Politics should be cooperative and full of interaction
What’s different and perhaps problematic is that there is now a ‘civil society’, where
interaction is no longer purely public or private. According to Marx, politics actually happen
in rather private interactions on the market, so this doesn’t really seem right.
Friends and enemies – Carl Schmitt
Carl Schmitt defines politics according to struggles. Basically, there is no politics without
disagreement.
- Politics should have an independent definition that is not equal to ‘the state’.
- Politics can be distinguished in ‘friends’ and ‘enemies’. Friends are allies and enemies
are to be in war with.
- Schmitt has critique on liberalism: a genuine political collective can not be counted
on, as it is typical for liberalists to look for a compromise.
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