Comments on: The Poverty of PPE, Episode Three

By: Rob

Rob — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 17:16:13 +0000

The ‘they’ was the author(s) (of the pamphlet).

I actually probably know even less than Ben about pre-1971 twentieth century political thought, but I would guess one complaint, which would chime well with the talk of values, might be that the discussion of socialism vs. capitalism was overly technocratic, focused on narrow productive indices rather than its social psychology (or something). But maybe someone’s said that already. This is what happens when you go away for the weekend.

By: Ben

Ben — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 09:01:54 +0000

Well, one of my overriding first impressions of that period was how people were discussing capitalism vs socialism (if not Marxism) as a live option.

By: Chris Brooke

Chris Brooke — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 23:57:20 +0000

I haven't seen a 1960s vintage paper, but it's not too hard to think of what might have been on it. They were big on the theory of punishment in those days (think of what went into Honderich's book on Punishment); look at the papers in the Quinton collection on Political Philosophy, at the early volumes of Laslett & Runciman on Politics, Philosophy and Society, or at the kinds of things that get chewed over in Brian Barry's Political Argument. I'm guessing that books like those would give you a pretty good guide to what the pre-1970s Theory of Politics paper might have been like, though I might be wrong.

By: Ben

Ben — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 22:07:17 +0000

According to my detailed historical understanding(!), there was no political theory before 1971 (at least, not since the last Great Dead Philosopher – probably Mill). Obviously, I know that’s not true – indeed, I’ve read some early 20th century stuff on democracy.

Nonetheless, I’d be interested to know what the content of their paper was and what would be made of the post-1971 Political Theory we do now, which does seem to address normative rather than linguistic questions. (At least, I take it people aren’t only arguing over words, though that does happen).

[p.s. I don't find the two Robs too confusing, as you can always hover over the link]

By: Chris Brooke

Chris Brooke — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 13:59:40 +0000

[Incidentally, there are currently two Robs commenting on these posts, so if at least one of them could add a bit to their name to avoid confusion, that would be good. Rob Jubb, I think, has rights of first occupancy on the "Rob" handle, if only at the Virtual Stoa!]

Who is the “they” here? People like Pateman? Students from the 1960s? Or other people?

By: Rob

Rob — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 13:52:44 +0000

Although I doubt that the content of the moral philosophy course would cheer the author, I think it is worth noting that it is probably usually less hardcore linguistic philosophy than it once was. The complaint he makes about that sort of moral philosophy is after all what Bernard Williams was getting at when he said something like ‘contemporary moral philosophy has found a new way of being boring, which is by not talking about morality at all’ in either Morality: an Introduction or Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy, both of which are pretty central texts for the moral philosophy course. Of course, I suppose what they really want is much less general reflection on what we should do: that’s why you get the thought that sociology and values go together, presumably. But that’s a call to role back academic specialization altogether, not an attack on particular forms of it.