Anatomy of Failure: Philosophy and Political ActionModern liberalism begins in the forgetting of the English Revolution. Anatomy of Failure seeks to right that wrong by exploring the concept of political action, playing its history against its philosophy. The 1640s are a period of institutional failure and political disaster: the country plunges into civil war, every agent is naked. Established procedures are thrown aside and the very grounds for action are fiercely debated and recast. Five queries emerge in the experience of the New Model Army, five queries that outline an anatomy of failure, isolating the points at which actors disagree, conflict flares up, and alliances dissolve: Who can act? On what grounds? Who is right about what is to be done? Why do we succeed or fail? If you and I split, were we ever united, and to what end? The application of these questions to the Leveller-agitator writings, and then to Thomas Hobbes and John Locke's philosophies, generates models of political action. No mere philosophical abstractions, the Hobbesian and Lockean models of sovereign and contractual action have dominated the very practice of politics for centuries. Today it is time to recuperate the Leveller-agitator model of joint action, a model unique in its adequacy to the threat of failure and in its vocation for building the common-wealth. Anatomy of Failure is ideal for upper-level undergraduates and postgraduates taking courses in Contemporary Political Philosophy, Continental Philosophy, Modern European Philosophy, Contemporary French Philosophy, Critical Theory and Radical Political Thought. |
Contents
| 1 | |
CHAPTER TWO 1647 The history of the Levelleragitators and the New Model Army | 29 |
Substances no longer act institutions act | 87 |
When institutions act subjects act | 131 |
Sovereign action and contractual action | 181 |
The Levelleragitators on joint action | 251 |
Notes | 271 |
| 283 | |
| 287 | |
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Common terms and phrases
absolute power active power agency agitators Alain Badiou alliance apology arbitrary argues argument Aristotle army’s chapter Christian church civil law claim command common commonwealth concept conscience consent consequences context contractual action critique Cromwell declares Descombes divine law doctrine English Civil War English Revolution executive exercise existence external failure faith God’s grandees grounds Hobbesian idea identifies identity individual institution Ireton John Locke judge judgement justice king laws of nature legislative Leviathan Locke’s Luther ment mixed modes Model Army model of action model of political moral multiple natural law negotiations nominalist one’s ontological parliament particular person philosophy political action political body position practice principle problem Putney Debates question Rainborough reason regiments religious right to resistance rule social contract society Socrates soldiers Solemn Engagement Spinoza substance theodicy thing Thomas Hobbes Thrasymachus tion unity Wildman worship