III. Some Problems in the Analysis of Political Thought and Action

Abstract

h AM MOST GRATEFUL to Professors Schochet and Wiener not just for their generosity in commenting on my work, but also for their accuracy in reporting my arguments and their perceptiveness as critics. It seems possible to respond to their remarks in one of two ways. One would be to pursue the implications of Wiener's article and try to provide some more historical information about the context of Hobbes's political thought. This strikes me as an attractive alternative, especially since I agree with his suggestion that I ought to devote more attention to analysing the nature of the social pressures which helped to prompt Hobbes and his sympathisers to espouse their peculiar brand of absolutism. (He does not mention, however, that this theme has already been brilliantly explored by K. V. Thomas, 1965.) The other alternative is to say something more about my general approach to the study of political theory, of which my work on Hobbes (as Schochet and Wiener both acknowledge) has mainly been intended to serve as an example. This strikes me as even more attractive, and it is this line of argument which I shall pursue.