Mario Ricciardi

Duns Scotus, Metaphysician. William A. Frank and Allan B. Wolter. Purdue University Press 1995, pp. 224 £27.50 Hb. ISBN 1–55753–071–8 £13.19 Pb. ISBN 1–55753–072–6 Plato in Renaissance England. Sears Jayne. Dordrecht, Boston & London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1995, pp. 197 Dfl. 190.00, $122.00, £80.00 hb. ISBN 0–7923–3060–9 Mechanismus und Subjektivität in der Philosophie von Thomas Hobbes (Quaestiones, 9). Michael Esfeld. Frommann‐Holzboog, Stuttgart‐Bad Cannstatt 1995, pp. 434. ISBN 3–7728–1699–1 Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz: The Concept of Substance in Seventeenth‐Century Metaphysics. R. S. Woolhouse. London: Routledge, 1993. £11.99. ISBN 0–415–09021–0, ISBN 0–415–09022–9 pb. Descartes et Regius. Autour de l'Explication de l'Esprit Humain. Edited by Theo Verbeek. Studies of the History of Ideas in the Low Countries. Rodopi, Amsterdam‐Atlanta, 1993, pp. 114 $23.50 pb. ISBN 90–5183–375‐X The God of Spinoza. A Philosophical Study. Richard Mason. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1997, pp. xiv + 272. £35.00. ISBN 0–521–58162–1 Robert Boyle and the Limits of Reason. Jan Wojcik. Cambridge University Press, 1997, pp. 243. £40.00. ISBN 0521–56029–2 An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. John Locke. Edited and abridged by Kenneth P. Winkler. Hackett Publishing Company, Indianapolis, 1996, pp. 416. £27.95 hb; £6.95 pb. ISBN 0–87220–217–8 hb. 0–87220–216‐X pb. John Locke and the Eighteenth Century Divines. Alan Sell. Cardiff, University of Wales Press, 1997, pp. 444. £40.00 hb. ISBN 0–7083–1409–0 The Margins of Orthodoxy. Heterodox Writing and Cultural Response, 1660–1750. Edited by Roger D. Lund. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. xiv + 298. £35.00. ISBN 0–521–47117‐X The Enigmatic Parting Shot: What was Hume's ‘Compleat Answer to Dr. Reid and to That Bigotted Silly Fellow, Beattie'? James Somerville. Ashgate Publishing Ltd., 1995. pp. 424. £47.50. ISBN 1–85972–083–8 Discursus Praeliminaris de Philosophia in Genere. Christian Wolff. Ed. and trans. into German by Günther Gawlick and Lothar Kreimendahl. Forschungen und Materialien zur deutschen Aufklärung, Abt. I, Bd. 1. Stuttgart: Frommann‐hotzboog, 1996, pp. lxviii + 299. ISBN 3–7728–1523–5 Practical Philosophy. Immanuel Kant. Translated and edited by Mary J. Gregor, with a General Introduction by Allen Wood. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1996, pp. xxxiii + 668. £50.00. ISBN 0–521–37103–1 Religion and Rational Theology. Immanuel Kant. Translated and edited by Allen Wood and George Di Giovanni. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, £45.00, pp. xxiv + 518. ISBN 0–521–25416–1 Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics. Immanuel Kant. Translated by Paul Carus, with a collection of essays edited by Beryl Logan. London, Routledge, 1996. £45.00, hb. ISBN 0–415–11575–2 £14.99 pb. pp. 264. ISBN 0–415–11576–0 Kant: Philosophic de l'Histoire. Edited by Norbert Waszek. Revue Germanique Internationale 6/1996. Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, pp. 220. ISBN 2–13–047698–8; ISSN 1253–7837 Johann Georg Hamann's Relational Metacriticism. Gwen Griffith Dickson. (Thelogische Bibliothek Töpelmann, Band 67). Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, New York, 1995, pp. xix + 534. ISBN 3–11–014437–9 Frege. Anthony Kenny. London, Penguin Books, 1995, pp. xii + 223. £7.99 pb. ISBN 0–14–012550–7 Russell. A. C. Grayling. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1996, pp. ix + 115. £5.99. ISBN 0–19–287683‐X.

The article has three parts. The first is devoted to the analysis of some features of Italian philosophy that might be used to explain why analytic philosophy of politics, and analytic philosophy in general, has few practitioners. The second part gives an explanation of the relatively small audience Rawls has among liberals in Italy. Some features of the Italian liberal tradition might be helpful in explaining this fact; hence a short presentation of these features (as exemplified by Croce) is outlined. The third part deals with the reception of Rawls's ideas among the small group of analytic political philosophers in Italy

Hart’s criticism of Devlin’s stance on the legal enforcement of morality has been highly influential in shaping a new liberal sensibility and in paving the way to many important legal reforms in the UK. After 50 years it is perhaps time to go back to Law, Liberty and Morality to see it in the perspective of the general evolution of Hart’s thought since the early 50s. This is a period of extraordinary creativity for the Oxford philosopher, in which he writes many important contributions to legal, moral and political philosophy. Prominent among these is ‘Are There Any Natural Rights?’, an article that sets the agenda for Hart’s subsequent work on liberty, fairness and rights, and provides the philosophical background for the liberal understanding of the relations between law and morality defended in Law, Liberty and Morality

This collection of original essays on political and legal theory concentrates on themes dealt with in the work of Felix Oppenheim, including fundamental political and legal concepts and their implications for the scope of morality in politics and international relations. Among the issues addressed are the relationship between empirical and normative definitions of "freedom", "power", and "interests", whether governments are free to act against the national interest, and whether they can ever be morally obliged to do so.