A bracingly provocative challenge to one of our most cherished ideas and institutionsMost people believe democracy is a uniquely just form of government.
A major intellectual history of the American Revolution and its influence on later revolutions in Europe and the AmericasThe Expanding Blaze is a sweeping history of how the American Revolution inspired revolutions throughout Europe and the Atlantic world in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
How the Ottomans refashioned and legitimated their rule through mystical imageries of authorityThe medieval theory of the caliphate, epitomized by the Abbasids (750-1258), was the construct of jurists who conceived it as a contractual leadership of the Muslim community in succession to the Prophet Muhammed's political authority.
A new and comprehensive look at the reasons behind successful or failed nation buildingNation Building presents bold new answers to an age-old question.
How competing visions of world order in the 1940s gave rise to the modern concept of globalismDuring and after the Second World War, public intellectuals in Britain and the United States grappled with concerns about the future of democracy, the prospects of liberty, and the decline of the imperial system.
In the years between the Revolutionary War and the drafting of the Constitution, American gentlemen-the merchants, lawyers, planters, and landowners who comprised the independent republic's elite-worked hard to maintain their positions of power.
A colorful history of utilitarianism told through the lives and ideas of Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, and its other foundersIn The Happiness Philosophers, Bart Schultz tells the colorful story of the lives and legacies of the founders of utilitarianism-one of the most influential yet misunderstood and maligned philosophies of the past two centuries.
In recent years, North American and European nations have sought to legally remake religion in other countries through an unprecedented array of international initiatives.
The second and final volume of the most authoritative English-language edition of Spinoza's writingsThe Collected Works of Spinoza provides, for the first time in English, a truly satisfactory edition of all of Spinoza's writings, with accurate and readable translations, based on the best critical editions of the original-language texts, done by a scholar who has published extensively on the philosopher's work.
The essential guide to the life, thought, and legacy of Adam SmithAdam Smith (1723-90) is perhaps best known as one of the first champions of the free market and is widely regarded as the founding father of capitalism.
A major new account of one of the leading philosopher-statesmen of the eighteenth centuryEdmund Burke (1730-97) lived during one of the most extraordinary periods of world history.
Europe's long sixteenth century-a period spanning the years roughly from the voyages of Columbus in the 1490s to the English Civil War in the 1640s-was an era of power struggles between avaricious and unscrupulous princes, inquisitions and torture chambers, and religious differences of ever more violent fervor.
A compelling reevaluation of the Enlightenment from one of its leading historiansIn this concise and powerful book, one of the world's leading historians of the Enlightenment provides a bracing and clarifying new interpretation of this watershed period.
A lively and accessible introduction to the Greek and Roman origins of our political ideasIn The Birth of Politics, Melissa Lane introduces the reader to the foundations of Western political thought, from the Greeks, who invented democracy, to the Romans, who created a republic and then transformed it into an empire.
A major new history of classical Greece-how it rose, how it fell, and what we can learn from itLord Byron described Greece as great, fallen, and immortal, a characterization more apt than he knew.
Compelling essays from one of today's most esteemed cultural criticsSpanning many historical and literary contexts, Moral Imagination brings together a dozen recent essays by one of America's premier cultural critics.
How the Radical Enlightenment inspired and shaped the French RevolutionHistorians of the French Revolution used to take for granted what was also obvious to its contemporary observers-that the Revolution was shaped by the radical ideas of the Enlightenment.
Why "e;the Muslim question"e; is really about the West and its own anxieties-not IslamIn the post-9/11 West, there is no shortage of strident voices telling us that Islam is a threat to the security, values, way of life, and even existence of the United States and Europe.
Now in paperback: the bestselling author of Gods Politics revives our hope in a politics that reflects our highest common values and offers a roadmap for solving our biggest social problems.
Timeless political wisdom from ancient history's greatest statesmanMarcus Cicero, Rome's greatest statesman and orator, was elected to the Roman Republic's highest office at a time when his beloved country was threatened by power-hungry politicians, dire economic troubles, foreign turmoil, and political parties that refused to work together.
The quotable Ai WeiweiThis collection of quotes demonstrates the elegant simplicity of Ai Weiwei's thoughts on key aspects of his art, politics, and life.
The past thirty years have seen a surge of empirical research into political decision making and the influence of framing effects--the phenomenon that occurs when different but equivalent presentations of a decision problem elicit different judgments or preferences.
Perhaps no other Western writer has more deeply probed the bitter struggle in the Muslim world between the forces of religion and law and those of violence and lawlessness as Noah Feldman.
Political moderation is the touchstone of democracy, which could not function without compromise and bargaining, yet it is one of the most understudied concepts in political theory.
Robert Wokler was one of the world's leading experts on Rousseau and the Enlightenment, but some of his best work was published in the form of widely scattered and difficult-to-find essays.
A comprehensive history of manhunting in the West, from ancient times to the presentTouching on issues of power, authority, and domination, Manhunts takes an in-depth look at the hunting of humans in the West, from ancient Sparta, through the Middle Ages, to the modern practices of chasing undocumented migrants.
In the 40s BCE, during his forced retirement from politics under Caesar's dictatorship, Cicero turned to philosophy, producing a massive and important body of work.
A provocative reflection on the dilemmas of modern loveThe sexual revolution is justly celebrated for the freedoms it brought-birth control, the decriminalization of abortion, the liberalization of divorce, greater equality between the sexes, women's massive entry into the workforce, and more tolerance of homosexuality.
What a Confucian constitutional government might look like in China's political futureAs China continues to transform itself, many assume that the nation will eventually move beyond communism and adopt a Western-style democracy.
Michael Ignatieff draws on his extensive experience as a writer and commentator on world affairs to present a penetrating account of the successes, failures, and prospects of the human rights revolution.
