Political philosophy

Counterrevolutionary Polemics: Katechon and Crisis in de Maistre, Donoso, and Schmitt

02.10.2020
M. Blake Wilson

Both republican and decisionist exceptionalism are illiberal: therefore, the challenge for the liberal constitutional theorist consists in determining whether it––the exception––can exist within the liberal framework. According to Lazar, this challenge can be met by using a Lockean “liberalism of experience” which treats the institutions that respond to the emergencies as merely instrumentally valuable, where the very existence of the institutions is flexible and subject to modification

ON THE COPERNICUS MOMENT

22.07.2019
Neil Lock

This is the last of a set of seven essays, in which I have been trying to understand and to diagnose the political, economic and ethical ills of our times.

What about the Workers? A Libertarian Answer

09.07.2019
Sean Gabb

I was called this morning by the BBC. It wanted me to comment on the claims that Sports direct, a chain of sports clothing shops, mistreats its workers – keeping them on zero-hours contracts, sometimes not paying them even the minimum wage, scaring them out of going sick, generally treating them like dirt. Would I care to go on air to defend the right of employers to behave in this way? I am increasingly turning down invitations to go on radio and television, and this was an invitation I declined. I suggested the researcher should call the Adam Smith Institute. This would almost certainly provide a young man to rhapsodise about the wonders of the free market. My own answer would be too complex for the average BBC presenter to understand, and I might be cut off in mid-sentence.

ON CONVIVIALS AND POLITICALS

25.06.2019
Neil Lock

Today, I’m going to compare and contrast the two sides in the big battle of our times. I call them Convivials and Politicals. Much of what I say today, I’ve already said in earlier essays. What is new, though, is how I choose to organize it.