Carl Schmitt's friend/enemy principle is exposed to in-depth philosophical analysis and historical examination with the aim of showing that the political follows hostility, violence and terror as form follows matter. The book argues that the partisan is an umbrella concept that includes the national and global terrorist.

Hobbes's philosophical discourse is deconstructed as the interplay of the drama of individual behaviour as perceived by rational "agents" and the detached analysis of conflict by a "political geometer". The author offers solutions to some long-standing problems in Hobbesian political philosophy (for example, the role of glory, Hobbes' pessimism) and shows the consistency of Hobbes' attempt to derive absolution as the only stable political association. Although based on extensive textual analysis of Hobbes' works and correspondence, the text is an exercise in political philosophy that students should find iconoclastic and experts challenging.

The idea of international political theory after Hobbes is a timely and lively focus through which to raise key questions about international politics, and to set up dialogues between historical political theory and contemporary theories of international relations about the legacy of Hobbes in international politics. The move by political theorists towards consideration of the international realm and the consequent blurring of the distinction between domestic and international politics over recent years has been marked. In the light of these changes, the role of Hobbes in the dominant realist theory of International Relations requires urgent re-examination. This book makes an important and distinctive contribution to the argument that international political theory is moving beyond the reading of Hobbes as a founding theorist of the modern state in an inter-state system perpetuated by orthodox International Relations. The volume brings together a set of internationally-respected researchers with an expertise on Hobbes' views on international relations in the context of the history of political thought, Hobbesian realism, and on Hobbes and contemporary international political theory.

Hobbes's philosophical discourse is deconstructed as the interplay of the drama of individual behaviour as perceived by rational agents and the detached analysis of conflict by a political geometer . The author solves some long-standing problems in Hobbesian political philosophy (e.g., the role of glory, Hobbes' pessimism) and shows the consistency of Hobbes' attempt to derive absolutism as the only stable political association. Although based on extensive textual analysis of Hobbes' works and correspondence, the book is an exercise in political philosophy that students will find iconoclastic and experts challenging.

The idea of international political theory after Hobbes is a timely and lively focus through which to raise key questions about international politics, and to set up dialogues between historical political theory and contemporary theories of international relations about the legacy of Hobbes in international politics. The move by political theorists towards consideration of the international realm and the consequent blurring of the distinction between domestic and international politics over recent years has been marked. In the light of these changes, the role of Hobbes in the dominant realist theory of International Relations requires urgent re-examination. This book makes an important and distinctive contribution to the argument that international political theory is moving beyond the reading of Hobbes as a founding theorist of the modern state in an inter-state system perpetuated by orthodox International Relations. The volume brings together a set of internationally-respected researchers with an expertise on Hobbes' views on international relations in the context of the history of political thought, Hobbesian realism, and on Hobbes and contemporary international political theory.