Political Theory General

[Anonymous No.7230010]

I want to get into reading Burke, but I have no idea where to start.

Could anybody happen to suggest a good starting point for him, or should I just jump straight into the Reflections?

Political theory thread, too.

[Anonymous No.7230397]

>>7230010

Burke's awful. Paine countered him on every single political point he ever made.

[Anonymous No.7230436]

>>7230010
Burke is one of the first best-selling authors of political theory, apart from some history of the French Revolution you don't need much to read him. Probably just read on some natural law theory on wikipedia or the stanford page on it. If you are going for the his aesthetic theory, then I'd say you should start from the greeks, since it's not entry-level at all.

>>7230397
Please. Paine is a B-tier philosopher and a disgusting liberal, compared to Burke, who actually wanted to protect people around the world. Paine is an anti-humanist terrorist accomplice.

[Anonymous No.7230442]

>>7230436

>Paine is an anti-humanist terrorist accomplice

[Anonymous No.7230445]

>>7230436
this

[Anonymous No.7230478]

>>7230436

>Burke, who actually wanted to protect people around the world

Only if "Lord" preceded their name.

[Anonymous No.7230488]

>>7230442
Good thing you posted his even dumber and equally aggressive modern counter-part. Fucking internationalists of all kind need to shown as the faggots that they.
Burke for example would have supported Gahndi, while le epin Paine and Hitch would just send in the jacobin or some sort of neo-liberals/cons to take full control.

[Anonymous No.7230497]

>>7230436
Thanks, anon. I read a little summary about Burke, and it shocked me how similar his views were in regards to religion, the state, and the French Revolution were.

Never read Paine, which is a bit embarrassing since I'm an American.

Also, to any Rousseau fans out there, I'm reading Emile right now. I can't say I'm a fan, the writing style rambles on far too much and his points are too muddled to make any sense, but that's just me.

[Anonymous No.7230507]

>>7230488

>Burke for example would have supported Gahndi, while le epin Paine and Hitch would just send in the jacobin or some sort of neo-liberals/cons to take full control

>>7230497

Read Paine. Don't take Rousseau too seriously.

[Anonymous No.7230524]

>>7230507
I honestly couldn't stand Rousseau or Locke very much either to be honest fam. Hobbes and Machiavelli currently are the pre-modern / modern Political Philosophers that are exercises influence on my ideology.

[Anonymous No.7230535]

>>7230524
OP here, I remember when I read Leviathan and The Prince I did exactly pic related.

[Anonymous No.7230547]

>>7230497
>Thanks, anon. I read a little summary about Burke, and it shocked me how similar his views were in regards to religion, the state, and the French Revolution were.

Still, he was a bit too much of a whig himself when it came to internal affairs. The whole slow reforms thing is kind of a bother, since society will either slowly go to good or to bad, but if Habit is the thing that rules the Nation, then a decisive change would not be of habit since the nation would only be comfortable with reform.
I think this is why the UK did way better than the continental Europe till WW2(no ebin Revolutions from nazis and commies), but past that the reform mindset seems a bit ungrateful to me.

pic related

[Anonymous No.7230549]

>>7230524

>Hobbes and Machiavelli currently are the pre-modern / modern Political Philosophers that are exercises influence on my ideology

Ugh, no, not another reactionary.

[Anonymous No.7230559]

I think politics are an illusion and that the Internet has more governmental agency nowadays than any actual "government." Whatever readings you have are history and bear little to no relevance to the current state of things.

[Anonymous No.7230565]

>>7230535
Then honestly it depends on where you want to go from here. I'd read their other works to get a more complete picture of what views they espouse and then how they do so. Then I'd get my hands on Journal articles as well as books written by scholars that are specific about Hobbes and Machiavelli. I think I have a lot of a couple titles although it isn't like you are hunting for something that is obscure.

[Anonymous No.7230617]

>>7230549
Both Hobbes and Machi were kind progressive. Absolutism at the time was the most progressive form of government and Nationalism was the carrier of progress 3 centuries after our roman cosplayer.

[Anonymous No.7230653]

tfw when socrates has the most based political theory

[Anonymous No.7230656]

>>7230565
My knowledge on political theory is pretty weak, but I should probably try to read Machiavelli's Discourses.

[Anonymous No.7230665]

>>7230617
This. I'm not an absolutist or an authoritarian but in contrast to anarchism or idealist views of democracy I lean towards more towards the right. I am also more interested in how their views can be applied to international relations theory so there is that.

[Anonymous No.7230682]

>>7230656
I'm fairly well informed, at least at the basic level. I probably know a good deal more that others on /lit/ I just hang out here because the shitposting isn't as strong and the environment is as collegial as one could hope to get.

[Anonymous No.7230730]

>>7230665
>I am also more interested in how their views can be applied to international relations theory so there is that.
>apply

You can't apply something that is an eternal apriori fact anon. I've been recently thinking that the small part about what to do when there are too much people in a country, in the Leviathan. China is currently showing us to do colonization in the 21rst century with it's Africa hijinks.

[Anonymous No.7230741]

>>7230730
Well then how would you rephrase that statement anon 2? I feel like we should explore this about China's 21st century colonialism in greater detail within the confines of this thread. I've been trying to create a thread for a while now about modern Chinese writing on military affairs and international relations but didn't have much luck. There was on particular Hawk that was brought up in a past thread but I couldn't remember his name.

[Anonymous No.7230765]

>>7230741
There no reason about thinking to apply the worldviews of Hobbes and Machi to IR, they are always the rules of the game. That's what I meant.

[Anonymous No.7230805]

>>7230765
To me in modern IR it helpful to confirm your assertions instead of assuming each present day theorist accepts to same framework that those of us who are situated in the school of Hobbes and Machiavelli view as a given. Also more specifically I'm interested at specific interpretations and applications of the theory, not just the general assumptions which explain operating conditions under anarchy.

[Anonymous No.7231168]

I'm about to read Kant's Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, On the Old Saw, and Perpetual Peace. Does /lit/ have any advice for me? ...

[Anonymous No.7231596]

Bump