Between 1650 and 1800 political thought in Europe was transformed by the need to come to terms with the rise of commercial economies and the open, mobile societies which they created. At the same time many political thinkers were inspired by the contemporary revolution in the natural sciences to attempt to place the understanding of man and society on a similarly new footing. New theories of human nature and historical development were advanced and the scope of political thinking extended to include the workings of economy and society. Among the key issues to be confronted as a result were the role of divine providence in human history, the historical authority of the Bible, the scope for religious toleration, the rights and obligations of the individual in person and property, the moral consequences of commerce and luxury, and the value of civilization itself.

The subject is studied in set texts by four authors and further texts by another six authors, all chosen for their intrinsic interest and because they illustrate the subject’s major themes and contrasts. The starting point is Hobbes’s Leviathan, whose rigorous attempt to place the understanding of man and society on a natural, scientific basis provided a constant reference point for later thinkers. By contrast, Vico’s New Science offers an extraordinarily imaginative historical account of how man became social. From the period of the Enlightenment, Rousseau’s Discourses On the Arts and Sciences, On the Origin of Inequality and On Political Economy present a radical critique of modern man and his civilization, while Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations and Theory of Moral Sentiments respectively expound the new discipline of political economy, and defend the moral values of modern society. The texts by Spinoza, Locke, Mandeville, Montesquieu, Herder and Kant enable you to reconstruct the debates which link the four set texts. The highly original thinking of Mandeville, for example, had a decisive impact on both Rousseau and Smith, while the moral and political philosophy of Kant provides a challenging climax to the paper as a whole.

If you have studied and enjoyed Theories of the State, this paper enables you to take your understanding of Hobbes and Rousseau a great deal further, discovering their contemporary impact, while reading new texts, such as Vico, which are quite different in character. But the paper is equally accessible to those coming to the history of political and social thought for the first time.