## 1. Major Political Writings



Hobbes wrote several versions of his political philosophy, including
*The Elements of Law, Natural and Politic* (also under the
titles *Human Nature* and *De Corpore Politico)*
published in 1650, *De Cive* (1642) published in English as
*Philosophical Rudiments Concerning Government and Society* in
1651, the English *Leviathan* published in 1651, and its Latin
revision in 1668. Others of his works are also important in
understanding his political philosophy, especially his history of the
English Civil War, *Behemoth* (published 1679), *De
Corpore* (1655), *De Homine* (1658), *Dialogue Between a
Philosopher and a Student of the Common Laws of England* (1681),
and *The Questions Concerning Liberty, Necessity, and Chance*
(1656). All of Hobbes's major writings are collected in *The
English Works of Thomas Hobbes*, edited by Sir William Molesworth
(11 volumes, London 1839-45), and *Thomae Hobbes Opera
Philosophica Quae Latina Scripsit Omnia*, also edited by
Molesworth (5 volumes; London, 1839-45). Oxford University Press
has undertaken a projected 26 volume collection of the *Clarendon
Edition of the Works of Thomas Hobbes*. So far 3 volumes are
available: *De Cive* (edited by Howard Warrender), *The
Correspondence of Thomas Hobbes* (edited by Noel Malcolm), and
*Writings on Common Law and Hereditary Right* (edited by Alan
Cromartie and Quentin Skinner). Recently Noel Malcolm has published a
three volume edition of *Leviathan*, which places the English
text side by side with Hobbes's later Latin version of it.
Readers new to Hobbes should begin with *Leviathan*, being sure
to read Parts Three and Four, as well as the more familiar and often
excerpted Parts One and Two. There are many fine overviews of
Hobbes's normative philosophy, some of which are listed in the
following selected bibliography of secondary works.


## 2. The Philosophical Project



Hobbes sought to discover rational principles for the construction of
a civil polity that would not be subject to destruction from within.
Having lived through the period of political disintegration
culminating in the English Civil War, he came to the view that the
burdens of even the most oppressive government are "scarce
sensible, in respect of the miseries, and horrible calamities, that
accompany a Civill Warre". Because virtually any government
would be better than a civil war, and, according to Hobbes's
analysis, all but absolute governments are systematically prone to
dissolution into civil war, people ought to submit themselves to an
absolute political authority. Continued stability will require that
they also refrain from the sorts of actions that might undermine such
a regime. For example, subjects should not dispute the sovereign power
and under no circumstances should they rebel. In general, Hobbes aimed
to demonstrate the reciprocal relationship between political obedience
and peace.


## 3. The State of Nature



To establish these conclusions, Hobbes invites us to consider what
life would be like in a state of nature, that is, a condition without
government. Perhaps we would imagine that people might fare best in
such a state, where each decides for herself how to act, and is judge,
jury and executioner in her own case whenever disputes arise--and
that at any rate, this state is the appropriate baseline against which
to judge the justifiability of political arrangements. Hobbes terms
this situation "the condition of mere nature", a state of
perfectly private judgment, in which there is no agency with
recognized authority to arbitrate disputes and effective power to
enforce its decisions.



Hobbes's near descendant, John Locke, insisted in his *Second
Treatise of Government* that the state of nature was indeed to be
preferred to subjection to the arbitrary power of an absolute
sovereign. But Hobbes famously argued that such a "dissolute
condition of masterlesse men, without subjection to Lawes, and a
coercive Power to tye their hands from rapine, and revenge"
would make impossible all of the basic security upon which
comfortable, sociable, civilized life depends. There would be
"no place for industry, because the fruit thereof is uncertain;
and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of
the commodities that may be imported by Sea; no commodious Building;
no Instruments of moving and removing such things as require much
force; no Knowledge of the face of the Earth; no account of Time; no
Arts; no Letters; and which is worst of all, continuall feare, and
danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty,
brutish, and short." If this is the state of nature, people have
strong reasons to avoid it, which can be done only by submitting to
some mutually recognized public authority, for "so long a man is
in the condition of mere nature, (which is a condition of war,) as
private appetite is the measure of good and evill."



Although many readers have criticized Hobbes's state of nature
as unduly pessimistic, he constructs it from a number of individually
plausible empirical and normative assumptions. He assumes that people
are sufficiently similar in their mental and physical attributes that
no one is invulnerable nor can expect to be able to dominate the
others. Hobbes assumes that people generally "shun death",
and that the desire to preserve their own lives is very strong in most
people. While people have local affections, their benevolence is
limited, and they have a tendency to partiality. Concerned that others
should agree with their own high opinions of themselves, people are
sensitive to slights. They make evaluative judgments, but often use
seemingly impersonal terms like 'good' and
'bad' to stand for their own personal preferences. They
are curious about the causes of events, and anxious about their
futures; according to Hobbes, these characteristics incline people to
adopt religious beliefs, although the content of those beliefs will
differ depending upon the sort of religious education one has happened
to receive.



With respect to normative assumptions, Hobbes ascribes to each person
in the state of nature a liberty right to preserve herself, which he
terms "the right of nature". This is the right to do
whatever one sincerely judges needful for one's preservation;
yet because it is at least possible that virtually anything might be
judged necessary for one's preservation, this theoretically
limited right of nature becomes in practice an unlimited right to
potentially anything, or, as Hobbes puts it, a right "to all
things". Hobbes further assumes as a principle of practical
rationality, that people should adopt what they see to be the
necessary means to their most important ends.


## 4. The State of Nature Is a State of War



Taken together, these plausible descriptive and normative assumptions
yield a state of nature potentially fraught with divisive struggle.
The right of each to all things invites serious conflict, especially
if there is competition for resources, as there will surely be over at
least scarce goods such as the most desirable lands, spouses, etc.
People will quite naturally fear that others may (citing the right of
nature) invade them, and may rationally plan to strike first as an
anticipatory defense. Moreover, that minority of prideful or
"vain-glorious" persons who take pleasure in exercising
power over others will naturally elicit preemptive defensive responses
from others. Conflict will be further fueled by disagreement in
religious views, in moral judgments, and over matters as mundane as
what goods one actually needs, and what respect one properly merits.
Hobbes imagines a state of nature in which each person is free to
decide for herself what she needs, what she's owed, what's
respectful, right, pious, prudent, and also free to decide all of
these questions for the behavior of everyone else as well, and to act
on her judgments as she thinks best, enforcing her views where she
can. In this situation where there is no common authority to resolve
these many and serious disputes, we can easily imagine with Hobbes
that the state of nature would become a "state of war",
even worse, a war of "all against all".


## 5. Further Questions About the State of Nature



In response to the natural question whether humanity ever was
generally in any such state of nature, Hobbes gives three examples of
putative states of nature. First, he notes that all sovereigns are in
this state with respect to one another. This claim has made Hobbes the
representative example of a "realist" in international
relations. Second, he opined that many now civilized peoples were
formerly in that state, and some few peoples--"the savage
people in many places of America" (*Leviathan*, XIII),
for instance--were still to his day in the state of nature. Third
and most significantly, Hobbes asserts that the state of nature will
be easily recognized by those whose formerly peaceful states have
collapsed into civil war. While the state of nature's condition
of perfectly private judgment is an abstraction, something resembling
it too closely for comfort remains a perpetually present possibility,
to be feared, and avoided.



Do the other assumptions of Hobbes's philosophy license the
existence of this imagined state of isolated individuals pursuing
their private judgments? Probably not, since, as feminist critics
among others have noted, children are by Hobbes's theory assumed
to have undertaken an obligation of obedience to their parents in
exchange for nurturing, and so the primitive units in the state of
nature will include families ordered by internal obligations, as well
as individuals. The bonds of affection, sexual affinity, and
friendship--as well as of clan membership and shared religious
belief--may further decrease the accuracy of any purely
individualistic model of the state of nature. This concession need not
impugn Hobbes's analysis of conflict in the state of nature,
since it may turn out that competition, diffidence and glory-seeking
are disastrous sources of conflicts among small groups just as much as
they are among individuals. Still, commentators seeking to answer the
question how precisely we should understand Hobbes's state of
nature are investigating the degree to which Hobbes imagines that to
be a condition of interaction among isolated individuals.



Another important open question is that of what, exactly, it is about
human beings that makes it the case (supposing Hobbes is right) that
our communal life is prone to disaster when we are left to interact
according only to our own individual judgments. Perhaps, while people
do wish to act for their own best long-term interest, they are
shortsighted, and so indulge their current interests without properly
considering the effects of their current behavior on their long-term
interest. This would be a type of failure of rationality.
Alternatively, it may be that people in the state of nature are fully
rational, but are trapped in a situation that makes it individually
rational for each to act in a way that is sub-optimal for all, perhaps
finding themselves in the familiar 'prisoner's
dilemma' of game theory. Or again, it may be that Hobbes's
state of nature would be peaceful but for the presence of persons
(just a few, or perhaps all, to some degree) whose passions overrule
their calmer judgments; who are prideful, spiteful, partial, envious,
jealous, and in other ways prone to behave in ways that lead to war.
Such an account would understand irrational human passions to be the
source of conflict. Which, if any, of these accounts adequately
answers to Hobbes's text is a matter of continuing debate among
Hobbes scholars. Game theorists have been particularly active in these
debates, experimenting with different models for the state of nature
and the conflict it engenders.


## 6. The Laws of Nature



Hobbes argues that the state of nature is a miserable state of war in
which none of our important human ends are reliably realizable.
Happily, human nature also provides resources to escape this miserable
condition. Hobbes argues that each of us, as a rational being, can see
that a war of all against all is inimical to the satisfaction of her
interests, and so can agree that "peace is good, and therefore
also the way or means of peace are good". Humans will recognize
as imperatives the injunction to seek peace, and to do those things
necessary to secure it, when they can do so safely. Hobbes calls these
practical imperatives "Lawes of Nature", the sum of which
is not to treat others in ways we would not have them treat us. These
"precepts", "conclusions" or
"theorems" of reason are "eternal and
immutable", always commanding our assent even when they may not
safely be acted upon. They forbid many familiar vices such as
iniquity, cruelty, and ingratitude. Although commentators do not agree
on whether these laws should be regarded as mere precepts of prudence,
or rather as divine commands, or moral imperatives of some other sort,
all agree that Hobbes understands them to direct people to submit to
political authority. They tell us to seek peace with willing others by
laying down part of our "right to all things", by mutually
covenanting to submit to the authority of a sovereign, and further
direct us to keep that covenant establishing sovereignty.


## 7. Establishing Sovereign Authority



When people mutually covenant each to the others to obey a common
authority, they have established what Hobbes calls "sovereignty
by institution". When, threatened by a conqueror, they covenant
for protection by promising obedience, they have established
"sovereignty by acquisition". These are equally legitimate
ways of establishing sovereignty, according to Hobbes, and their
underlying motivation is the same--namely fear--whether of
one's fellows or of a conqueror. The social covenant involves
both the renunciation or transfer of right and the authorization of
the sovereign power. Political legitimacy depends not on how a
government came to power, but only on whether it can effectively
protect those who have consented to obey it; political obligation ends
when protection ceases.


## 8. Absolutism



Although Hobbes offered some mild pragmatic grounds for preferring
monarchy to other forms of government, his main concern was to argue
that effective government--whatever its form--must have
absolute authority. Its powers must be neither divided nor limited.
The powers of legislation, adjudication, enforcement, taxation,
war-making (and the less familiar right of control of normative
doctrine) are connected in such a way that a loss of one may thwart
effective exercise of the rest; for example, legislation without
interpretation and enforcement will not serve to regulate conduct.
Only a government that possesses all of what Hobbes terms the
"essential rights of sovereignty" can be reliably
effective, since where partial sets of these rights are held by
different bodies that disagree in their judgments as to what is to be
done, paralysis of effective government, or degeneration into a civil
war to settle their dispute, may occur.



Similarly, to impose limitation on the authority of the government is
to invite irresoluble disputes over whether it has overstepped those
limits. If each person is to decide for herself whether the government
should be obeyed, factional disagreement--and war to settle the
issue, or at least paralysis of effective government--are quite
possible. To refer resolution of the question to some further
authority, itself also limited and so open to challenge for
overstepping its bounds, would be to initiate an infinite regress of
non-authoritative 'authorities' (where the buck never
stops). To refer it to a further authority itself unlimited, would be
just to relocate the seat of absolute sovereignty, a position entirely
consistent with Hobbes's insistence on absolutism. To avoid the
horrible prospect of governmental collapse and return to the state of
nature, people should treat their sovereign as having absolute
authority.


## 9. Responsibility and the Limits of Political Obligation



When subjects institute a sovereign by authorizing it, they agree, in
conformity with the principle "no wrong is done to a consenting
party", not to hold it liable for any errors in judgment it may
make and not to treat any harms it does to them as actionable
injustices. Although many interpreters have assumed that by
authorizing a sovereign, subjects become morally responsible for the
actions it commands, Hobbes instead insists that "the external
actions done in obedience to [laws], without the inward approbation,
are the actions of the sovereign, and not of the subject, which is in
that case but as an instrument, without any motion of his own at
all" (Leviathan xlii, 106). It may be important to
Hobbes's project of persuading his Christian readers to obey
their sovereign that he can reassure them that God will not hold them
responsible for wrongful actions done at the sovereign's
command, because they cannot reasonably be expected to obey if doing
so would jeopardize their eternal prospects. Hence Hobbes explains
that "whatsoever a subject...is compelled to do in obedience to
his sovereign, and doth it not in order to his own mind, but in order
to the laws of his country, that action is not his, but his
sovereign's." (Leviathan xlii. 11) This position
reinforces absolutism by permitting Hobbes to maintain that subjects
can obey even commands to perform actions they believe to be sinful
without fear of divine punishment.



Hobbes's description of the way in which persons should be
understood to become subjects to a sovereign authority changes from
his *Elements* and *De Cive* accounts to his
*Leviathan* account. In the former, each person lays down their
rights (of self-government and to pursue all things they judge useful
or necessary for their survival and commodious living) in favor of one
and the same sovereign person (whether a natural person, as a monarch,
or an artificial person, as a rule-governed assembly). In these
earlier accounts, sovereigns alone retain their right of nature to act
on their own private judgment in all matters, and also exercise the
transferred rights of subjects. Whether exercising its own retained
right of nature or the subjects' transferred rights, the
sovereign's action is attributable to the sovereign itself, and
it bears moral responsibility for it. In contrast, Hobbes's
*Leviathan* account has each individual covenanting to
"own and authorize" all of the sovereign's
actions--whatever the sovereign does as a public figure or
commands that subjects do. This change creates an apparent
inconsistency in Hobbes's theory of responsibility for actions
done at the sovereign's command; *if* in "owning
and authorizing" all their sovereign's actions, subjects
become morally responsible for all that it does and all they do in
obedience to its commands, Hobbes cannot consistently maintain his
position that merely obedient actions in response to sovereign
commands are the moral responsibility of the sovereign alone. One
resolution of this apparent inconsistency denies that Hobbes's
idea of authorization carries along responsibility for the act
authorized, as our contemporary idea of authorization generally does.




While Hobbes insists that we should regard our governments as having
absolute authority, he reserves to subjects the liberty of disobeying
some of their government's commands. He argues that subjects
retain a right of self-defense against the sovereign power, giving
them the right to disobey or resist when their lives are in danger. He
also gives them seemingly broad resistance rights in cases in which
their families or even their honor are at stake. These exceptions have
understandably intrigued those who study Hobbes. His ascription of
apparently inalienable rights--what he calls the "true
liberties of subjects"--seems incompatible with his defense
of absolute sovereignty. Moreover, if the sovereign's failure to
provide adequate protection to subjects extinguishes their obligation
to obey, and if it is left to each subject to judge for herself the
adequacy of that protection, it seems that people have never really
exited the fearsome state of nature. This aspect of Hobbes's
political philosophy has been hotly debated ever since Hobbes's
time. Bishop Bramhall, one of Hobbes's contemporaries, famously
accused *Leviathan* of being a "Rebell's
Catechism." More recently, some commentators have argued that
Hobbes's discussion of the limits of political obligation is the
Achilles' heel of his theory. It is not clear whether or not
this charge can stand up to scrutiny, but it will surely be the
subject of much continued discussion.


## 10. Religion and Social Instability



The last crucial aspect of Hobbes's political philosophy is his
treatment of religion. Hobbes progressively expands his discussion of
Christian religion in each revision of his political philosophy, until
it comes in *Leviathan* to comprise roughly half the book.
There is no settled consensus on how Hobbes understands the
significance of religion within his political theory. Some
commentators have argued that Hobbes is trying to demonstrate to his
readers the compatibility of his political theory with core Christian
commitments, since it may seem that Christians' religious duties
forbid their affording the sort of absolute obedience to their
governors which Hobbes's theory requires of them. Others have
doubted the sincerity of his professed Christianity, arguing that by
the use of irony or other subtle rhetorical devices, Hobbes sought to
undermine his readers' religious beliefs. Howsoever his
intentions are properly understood, Hobbes's obvious concern
with the power of religious belief is a fact that interpreters of his
political philosophy must seek to explain.


## 11. Hobbes on Gender and Race



Scholars are increasingly interested in how Hobbes thought of the
status of women, and of the family. Hobbes was one of the earliest
western philosophers to count women as persons when devising a social
contract among persons. He insists on the equality of all people, very
explicitly including women. People are equal because they are all
subject to domination, and all potentially capable of dominating
others. No person is so strong as to be invulnerable to attack while
sleeping by the concerted efforts of others, nor is any so strong as
to be assured of dominating all others.



In this relevant sense, women are naturally equal to men. They are
equally naturally free, meaning that their consent is required before
they will be under the authority of anyone else. In this,
Hobbes's claims stand in stark contrast to many prevailing views
of the time, according to which women were born inferior to and
subordinate to men. Sir Robert Filmer, who later served as the target
of John Locke's *First Treatise of Government*, is a
well-known proponent of this view, which he calls patriarchalism.
Explicitly rejecting the patriarchalist view as well as Salic law,
Hobbes maintains that women can be sovereigns; authority for him is
"neither male nor female". He also argues for natural
maternal right: in the state of nature, dominion over children
naturally belongs to the mother. He adduced the example of the Amazon
warrior women as evidence.



In seeming contrast to this egalitarian foundation, Hobbes spoke of
the commonwealth in patriarchal language. In the move from the state
of nature to civil society, families are described as
"fathers", "servants", and
"children", seemingly obliterating mothers from the
picture entirely. Hobbes justifies this way of talking by saying that
it is fathers not mothers who have founded societies. As true as that
is, it is easy to see how there is a lively debate between those who
emphasize the potentially feminist or egalitarian aspects of
Hobbes's thought and those who emphasize his ultimate exclusion
of women. Such debates raise the question: To what extent are the
patriarchal claims Hobbes makes integral to his overall theory, if
indeed they are integral at all?



We find similar ambiguities and tensions in what Hobbes says about
race (or what we would now call race). On the one hand, he invokes the
"savages" of the Americas to illustrate the
"brutish" conditions of life in the state of nature. On
the other hand, when he simply denies that there are innate or
immutable differences between Native Americans and Europeans.
Societies which have enjoyed scientific advancement have done so,
according to Hobbes, because of the existence of "leisure
time," and if that is "supposed away," he asks
rhetorically, "what do we differ from the wildest of the
Indians?"