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Great Books on Hobbes:
Great Books on Hobbes:
Baumgold, Deborah. Hobbes's Political Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988.
Boonin-Vail, David. Thomas Hobbes and the Science of Moral Virtue. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.
Ewin, R. E. Virtues and Rights: The Moral Philosophy of Thomas Hobbes. Boulder: Westview Press, 1991.
Gauthier, David. The Logic of Leviathan: The Moral and Political Theory of Thomas Hobbes. Clarendon Press, 1969.
Hampton, Jean. Hobbes and the Social Contract Tradition. Cambridge [Cambridgeshire]: Cambridge University Press, 1986.
Kavka, Gregory S. Hobbesian Moral and Political Theory. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press, 1986.
Lloyd, S. A. Ideals as Interests in Hobbes's Leviathan:The Power of Mind Over Matter. Cambridge [England]: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
Martinich, Aloysius. A Hobbes Dictionary. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers, 1995.
---. The Two Gods of Leviathan: Thomas Hobbeson Religion and Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
Van Mill, David. Liberty, Rationality, and Agency inHobbes's Leviathan. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2001.
Hobbes Journals:
Hobbes Journals:
Hobbes's Works:
Hobbes's Works:
Good Websites:
Good Websites:
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy -- "Thomas Hobbes"
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy -- "Hobbes's Moral and Political Philosophy"
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy -- "Hobbes: Moral and Political Philosophy"
Courtland on Hobbes:
Courtland on Hobbes:
(EDITOR) Hobbesian Applied Ethics and Public Policy (Routledge Research in Applied Ethics) (2017).
Abstract: Most philosophers and political scientists readily admit that Thomas Hobbes is a significant figure in the history of political thought. His theory was, arguably, one of the first to provide a justification for political legitimacy from the perspective of each individual subject. Many excellent books and articles have examined the justification and structure of Hobbes’ commonwealth, ethical system, and interpretation of Christianity. What is troubling is that the Hobbesian project has been largely missing in the applied ethics and public policy literature. We often find applications of Kantian deontology, Bentham’s or Mill’s utilitarianism, Rawls’s contractualism, the ethics of care, and various iterations of virtue ethics. Hobbesian accounts are routinely ignored and often derided. This is unfortunate because Hobbes’s project offers a unique perspective. To ignore it, when such a perspective would be fruitful to apply to another set of theoretical questions, is a problem in need of a remedy. This volume seeks to eliminate (or, at the very least, partially fill) this gap in the literature.
Not only will this volume appeal to those that are generally familiar with Hobbesian scholarship, it will also appeal to a variety of readers that are largely unfamiliar with Hobbes.
"The Not-So Prolife Leviathan," American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly. (September 2020).
Abstract: In an article that appeared in American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly, Kody Cooper argued that “to be a Hobbesian is to be prolife.” In this essay, I will provide an argument that rebuts Cooper’s prolife interpretation of Hobbes. First, I will argue that Cooper has, without argument, committed an equivocation between a person’s personal identity and his or her organism. Resolving this ambiguity would allow for an interpretation of Hobbes that can consistently reject the notion that the life of a person “begins at conception.” Second, I will show that Cooper fails to take into account the significant costs that are placed upon prospective mothers and is therefore not able to judge whether or not aborting a fetus is within a mother’s enlightened self-interest. Third, I will, contrary to Cooper, show why it may be acceptable for a Hobbesian sovereign to construct a legal regime that is permissive of abortion.
"Hobbesian Right to Healthcare", Journal of Applied Philosophy. Vol. 34 (February 2017), 99-113.
Abstract: Over the last few years we have had a debate regarding the role of government in providing healthcare. There has been a question as to whether or not the state's proper role requires protection of its subjects from the calamities associated with a lack of healthcare. In this essay, I will argue that straightforward Hobbesian principles require the state to provide healthcare. It might be odd (or, at the very least, anachronistic) that such a positive right can be justified by a philosopher whose most famous quote is, "the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." Nonetheless, Hobbes's political theory provides the framework for such a right.
"Hobbesian Justification for Animal Rights", Journal of Environmental Philosophy. Vol. 8 (Fall 2011) 23-46.
Abstract: Hobbes’s political and ethical theories are rarely viewed as places by which those who protect the weak seek refuge. It would seem odd, then, to suggest that such a theory might be able to protect the weakest among us—non-human animals. In this paper, however, I will defend the possibility of a Hobbesian justification for animal rights. The Hobbesian response to the problem of compliance allows contractarianism to extend (at least some) normative protection to animals. Such protection, as I will argue, has a similar justificational foundation as the protection we offer other humans
“A Prima Facie Defense of Hobbesian Absolutism”, Pacific Philosophical Quarterly. Vol. 9 (December 2009), 419-449.
Abstract: Hobbes advocates ‘thin absolutism’; a system of authority that merely ensures respect of the core concepts of sovereignty – hierarchy and normative closure. This new interpretation of Hobbes's absolutism shows that the concerns regarding sovereign tyranny are not fatal to his account of political authority. With thin absolutism, the sovereign is neither necessarily ineffective nor inherently dangerous. This, then, leaves Hobbesian absolutism in the position of being a ‘reasonable contender’– a system of political authority that might require our allegiance, but at the very least requires serious attention.
“Public Reason and the Hobbesian Dilemma”, Hobbes Studies Vol. 20 (2008), 63-92.
Abstract: Hobbesian accounts of public reason (provided by David Gauthier and Michael Ridge) are forced to face a tension that is presented for any theorist that toes the Hobbesian line. This tension has been referred to as the “Hobbesian Dilemma.” On one horn, we are afraid that we might create a monster with our authorization of an absolute sovereign. On the other horn, we are afraid that if we do not hand over unlimited power to the sovereign (and to its judgment) we will not be freed from the conflict that is endemic to our reliance upon private pluralistic standards. These Hobbesians, stressing the first horn, are afraid of authorizing a supreme political entity, so they provide modifications that serve to restrict such an entity. Such modifications, however, necessarily reintroduce pluralism back into the commonwealth. But if we take Hobbes seriously and accept that pluralism generates a state of war, the reintroduction of pluralism must be viewed as disastrous
Hobbesian Public Reason, Dissertation, (Director, Eric Mack) (2008) 296 pages.
Abstract: Hobbesian accounts of public reason have attempted to soften Hobbes's absolutism. They realize that there is a tension that is presented for any theorist that toes the Hobbesian line. Modern Hobbesians are afraid of authorizing a supreme political entity, so they provide modifications that serve to restrict such an entity. These modifications, however, necessarily reintroduce pluralism back into the commonwealth. But if we take Hobbes seriously and accept that pluralism generates a state of war, the reintroduction of pluralism must be viewed as disastrous. A purely procedural account of public reason can provide a solution to an intransigent problem (infinite regress of pluralistic interpretation) that tends to plague the more modern Hobbesian accounts. This can only be accomplished by defending an interpretation of a portion of Hobbes’s theory that has been staunchly avoided -- Hobbesian absolutism
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