Skinner and Rosanvallon: Reconciling the History of Political Thought with Political Philosophy
Skinner and Rosanvallon: Reconciling the History of Political Thought with Political Philosophy

Summary/Abstract: This paper addresses the issue of whether a proper history of political thought should avoid any contact with substantive political philosophy, as it was vehemently claimed earlier by Cambridge historians of political thought, or not. It argues that (A) a strong political or philosophical bias might kill the credibility of a reliable history of political thought, but (B), in this genre, it is by definition impossible to avoid taking on board politico-philosophical concerns. What is more, the paper also tries to show (C) the relevance of political philosophy for the history of political thought and vice versa. In particular, it will argue along the following two lines: (a) Without a political philosophical self-positioning any reconstruction of the history of political thought remains underdetermined and therefore uninstructive, and (b) without a look at the history of political thought political philosophy remains blind, alienated, theoretically unfounded and therefore potentially even dangerous. Methodologically, the paper aims to recapture some of the conclusions of the debates of the relationship of the two disciplines, with special attention to the French and British contexts (more particularly to the oeuvres of Rosanvallon and Skinner).

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