Religion & State, General & Miscellaneous British Philosophy, 19th Century British Philosophy, 18th Century British Philosophy, Great Britain - Polititcs, Government & Law - General, 17th Century British History - Commonwealth & Protectorate
Liberal political thought-from its origins in the seventeenth-century through today's rights discourse-is grounded in the ideal of the autonomous individual. As the theory holds, these individuals are 'born in freedom' from religious, political, social or economic obligations and then construct these systems through individual and collective choices. Over the past thirty years, however, this understanding of freedom has been challenged from a variety of perspectives. Eldon J. Eisenach has been at the forefront of that challenge, stressing the centrality of religious elements and assumptions in liberal writings that many scholars suppressed or ignored. In Narrative Power and Liberal Truth Eisenach brings together eleven of his previously published essays to demonstrate that many 'postmodernist' ideas of persons and freedom are already present within the tradition of liberal political philosophy and that liberalism itself is more capacious of human experience and meanings than modern critiques allow.
About the Author, Eldon J. Eisenach
Eldon J. Eisenach is professor of political science at the University of Tulsa, and author of The Next Religious Establishment.
Serious scholars of any of these thinkers will benefit from Eisenach's book. Recommended.
Political Studies Review
Fine writing style and impressive depth of scholarship.
Booknews
Eisenach (political science, U. of Tulsa) brings together a collection of his previously published articles and review essays on Hobbes, Locke, and Mill, to extend and develop the ideas he initially presented in . He also includes a chapter on Bentham's theory of history for its relationship to Locke's theory of economic and moral development, and a chapter on crime and punishment. Eisenach challenges traditional understandings of freedom in liberal political thought, and emphasizes the centrality of religious elements and assumptions in liberal writing generally overlooked or suppressed by most scholars. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
