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11Ockham's right reason and the genesis of the political as ‘absolutist’History of Political Thought 20 (1): 35-64. 1999.My aim is to explain the relation of ‘right reason’ to Ockham's voluntarism by analysing what Ockham takes individual liberty to mean and how men come to know of it. The Christian law of liberty reveals what individuals come to know by other means — from their own experiences and reason, about certain rights which can never be alienated either to Church or ‘state’. It is argued that his distinctive and later political positions can be supported by positions maintained in his earlier logical, psy…Read more
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22The History of Political Thought in a Modern University: The First Henry Tudor Memorial LectureHistory of Political Thought 21 (1): 152-172. 2000.It is not clear to me that there is any longer the institutional will to train students, as both Henry and I were trained, in the languages, histories and philosophies that enable one to approach the texts of classical, medieval and renaissance intellectual history in particular. Today a student who is drawn to a study of pre-modern ideas and historical settings will be asked why on earth such an irrelevant subject matter should attract any interest or indeed, funding. Even in Politics Departmen…Read more
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64Pre-Modern Property and Self-Ownership Before and After LockeEuropean Journal of Political Theory 4 (2): 125-145. 2005.Self-ownership is a central concept not only in Anglo-American liberal/libertarian discourse but also in Marxism. This article investigates what it means to say that a person has fundamental entitlement to full property in himself. It looks at possible moments when pre-modern concepts of the self became modern ones, examining Locke’s Second Treatise and his Essay Concerning Human Understanding. The aim is to focus on continuities and discontinuities in the transition from pre-modern to modern co…Read more
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48A History of Political Thought: From the Middle Ages to the RenaissanceWiley-Blackwell. 2000.This volume continues the story of European political theorising by focusing on medieval and Renaissance thinkers. It includes extensive discussion of the practices that underpinned medieval political theories and which continued to play crucial roles in the eventual development of early-modern political institutions and debates. The author strikes a balance between trying to understand the philosophical cogency of medieval and Renaissance arguments on the one hand, elucidating why historically-…Read more
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2A History of Political Thought from Ancient Greece to Early ChristianityPhilosophical Quarterly 54 (215): 338-340. 2004.
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Medieval Political Theory c. 1000-1500In George Klosko (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of the History of Political Philosophy, Oxford University Press. 2011.
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16El concepto de república. Continuidad mítica y continuidad realRes Pública. Revista de Historia de Las Ideas Políticas 15 (1). 2005.
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18JH Burns and the history of political thought: a celebrationHistory of Political Thought 20 (1 Spec). 1999.
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Western Carolina UniversityGraduate student
Cullowhee, North Carolina, United States of America