What is political philosophy?

First of all, the main western views on the nature of political philosophy.

Leo Strauss believes that political philosophy belongs to a branch of philosophy, and its disciplinary nature is explained by the disciplinary nature of philosophy. Leo Strauss inherited the ancient Greek philosophy and thought that philosophy was the pursuit of truth. Therefore, since political philosophy is a branch of philosophy, it is also the pursuit of truth in political activities.

For modern philosophy, political philosophy is the history of political philosophy. This view can be inferred from Hegel's famous words. Although "classical political philosophy explores the essence of political phenomena and the best or just political order, rather than studying the same."

Special phenomena related to political history? Not to mention studying the history of political philosophy "1.

However, after more than 2,000 years of complicated and difficult political practice, modern political philosophy has gained a strong sense of history and reached a * * * understanding of the importance of studying classic works and discussing those basic and eternal issues.

Political philosophy is an inquiry into the basic concepts, elements, structures and problems of general political activities. Jeffrey thomas, a British scholar, wrote An Introduction to Political Philosophy based on this idea, which can be classified into the tradition of analytical philosophy.

Thomas also pointed out that political philosophy is different from political science or political history, because the latter two are empirical and descriptive, and they explain or describe how a government actually works; Political philosophy, on the other hand, is normative, trying to establish norms or ideal standards and stipulate how the government should operate.

Political philosophy studies the moral basis of political activities and political ideas. Will. Jinlika said in Introduction to Contemporary Political Philosophy: "The political philosophy I understand is a kind of moral argument, and moral argument has to resort to our thoughtful intuition. When I say this, I am approaching my common sense about moral and political arguments. This common sense includes the following contents: first, we have reason to think that they are either right or wrong; Finally, these reasons and beliefs can be organized into systematic moral principles and justice theories. Therefore, one of the central goals of political philosophy is to deal with those who compete with each other.

Judge the theories of justice, then evaluate the strength and consistency of these theories and defend your position. "2

beautiful

China scholar Ian Shapiro wrote "The Moral Basis of Politics" 3.

In fact, it is a history of political philosophy since enlightenment, and democratic politics is its basic position and defense object.

Second, what is political philosophy —— A brief introduction to jeffrey thomas's Introduction to Political Philosophy.

Jeffrey thomas believes that any kind of academic inquiry should ask four questions: (1) What is its research field and subject? (2) What is the research method? (3) What is its internal structure, and what organizations and branches are there? (4) What is the value of this query?

The object of political philosophy research is very clear, that is, political activities. So what is political activity? The author soon gave up his efforts to define it from the extension and tried to reveal its connotation. The author discusses the connotation of political activities from four angles: (1) teleology; (2) presupposition; (3) Forum or arena; (4) process. The author pays more attention to the following arguments: (1) Aristotle believes that the purpose of city-state politics is to promote the happiness of its citizens, and the condition for obtaining happiness is to fully practice virtue; (2) The premise of politics is differences or conflicts of interest among groups; (3) The authorities, such as the government, the police and the army, are necessary to formulate and implement various decisions to integrate society; (4) Foucault believes that as long as there is power relations, there will be politics, and power relations are all over the society. Saulier believes that conflict and opposition are common phenomena in social relations. Then, according to the system theory, political activities are divided into five elements: (1) public subjects, such as societies, communities and nationalities; (2) The public domain refers to all kinds of affairs related to collective decision-making; (3) Policy choice of public sector; (4) the form of collective decision-making, including a legitimate group of voters and a legislature in modern western society; (5) Administrative and compulsory authorities, including administrative and judicial fields. Finally, the author makes an introductory discussion on the relationship between political subsystem and social mother system, political dynamics, political value theory and moral law.