Politics can be judged by its assumptions and consequences. Thomas Hobbes (AD 1588 – 1679) was an English political thinker who lived in the turbulent times of the English Civil War and the Wars of Religion. Undoubtedly, his historical situation influenced his political imagination greatly, an imagination captured in his words, “nature is red in tooth and claw.” The thought and project of Hobbes has been very much present in the shadows of power, and has been the operative assumption in international relations and political enterprise concerned chiefly with power. This course endeavours to read the text of the Leviathan critically, to understand the thought of Hobbes consequentially. Does Hobbes’s political imagination reflect a limited horizon, and, if so, what are the consequences for the subsequent history of political thought? Are there any viable alternatives to the great leviathan of Hobbes?
This class will study selected examples of utopian literature, including the the early modern works More's Utopia and Bacon's New Atlantis, the late Victorian vision of Edward Bellamy in Looking Backward, and Margaret Atwood's The Year of the Flood. Selected examples of utopian thought and experiment will include historical concepts of progress and decline, intentional communities and planned cities. Humanities 260 may be counted as an English elective.