Montesquieu was among the most influential writers of the eighteenth century, and the study of his thought enriches and complicates our understanding of the Enlightenment. Following renewed interest in his writings over the last three decades, the Cambridge Companion to Montesquieu brings together the variety of disciplinary and interpretive approaches that have shaped the scholarship on his work and legacy. This Companion offers an integrated volume on Montesquieu as philosopher, novelist, historian, economic thinker, political scientist, and political theorist. It introduces readers to key themes and ongoing debates, reflects developments in the field, breaks fresh ground, indicates avenues for future research, and provides multiple perspectives on the relevance of Montesquieu's thought to contemporary problems in political theory.

Montesquieu was among the most influential writers of the eighteenth century, and the study of his thought enriches and complicates our understanding of the Enlightenment. Following renewed interest in his writings over the last three decades, the Cambridge Companion to Montesquieu brings together the variety of disciplinary and interpretive approaches that have shaped the scholarship on his work and legacy. This Companion offers an integrated volume on Montesquieu as philosopher, novelist, historian, economic thinker, political scientist, and political theorist. It introduces readers to key themes and ongoing debates, reflects developments in the field, breaks fresh ground, indicates avenues for future research, and provides multiple perspectives on the relevance of Montesquieu's thought to contemporary problems in political theory.

The case for an eco-emancipatory politics to release the Earth from human domination and free us all from lives that are both exploitative and exploited Human domination of nature shapes every aspect of our lives today, even as it remains virtually invisible to us. Because human beings are a part of nature, the human domination of nature circles back to confine and exploit people as well-and not only the poor and marginalized but also the privileged and affluent, even in the world's most prosperous societies. Although modern democracy establishes constraints intended to protect people from domination as the arbitrary exercise of power, it offers few such protections for nonhuman parts of nature. The result is that, wherever we fall in human hierarchies, we inevitably find ourselves both complicit in and entrapped by a system that makes sustainable living all but impossible. It confines and exploits not only nature but people too, albeit in different ways. In Eco-Emancipation, Sharon Krause argues that we can find our way to a better, freer life by constraining the use of human power in relation to nature and promoting nature's well-being alongside our own, thereby releasing the Earth from human domination and freeing us from a way of life that is both exploitative and exploited, complicit and entrapped. Eco-emancipation calls for new, more-than-human political communities that incorporate nonhuman parts of nature through institutions of representation and regimes of rights, combining these new institutional arrangements with political activism, a public ethos of respect for nature, and a culture of eco-responsibility.

"'Our minds are changed when our hearts are engaged, ' With these words, "Civil Passions" takes a giant step forward in understanding the affective dimensions of political deliberation. Krause's challenge to the reason-based theories of Kant, Rawls, and Habermas, among others, will be debated--perhaps fiercely--by the next generation. She lays bare the fault lines of the issue and makes a compelling argument for basing moral motivation in affect. She also suggests how we might base moral norms themselves in reflective sentiments, or impartial feelings about feelings. The book is thoughtful and inspired, powered by acute powers of analysis and a lively sensibility."--Jane Mansbridge, Harvard University

"In recent years scholars have increasingly argued that affect plays a greater role in our practical reasoning than is traditionally admitted. Krause agrees, but she also knows that this insight is really only the announcement of the need for a major undertaking: understanding exactly how passions necessarily inform our reason and how 'civil passions' and 'affective impartiality' ought to guide our judgment, deliberation, and decision making in moral and political life. Her book takes up this task with real imagination, careful argumentation, and original insight."--Stephen K. White, University of Virginia

""Civil Passions" is an ambitious attempt to restore Hume's account of moral sentiment as an alternative to the Kantian perspective that dominates contemporary political theory, and to flesh out the significance of the Humean approach for contemporary liberal democracy. This is an important book."--William A. Galston, Brookings Institution

"This superb book is beautifullywritten; contains an elegant and finely honed argument; and makes a highly original contribution to contemporary deliberative democratic theory, contemporary theories of emotions in politics, and the philosophical literature on David Hume. Krause puts forward a clearer and more convincing account of the role played by sentiments and concerns in the processes of democratic deliberation and norm justification than any other contemporary theorist of affect."--Christina Tarnopolsky, McGill University

What does it mean to be free? We invoke the word frequently, yet the freedom of countless Americans is compromised by social inequalities that systematically undercut what they are able to do and to become. If we are to remedy these failures of freedom, we must move beyond the common assumption, prevalent in political theory and American public life, that individual agency is best conceived as a kind of personal sovereignty, or as self-determination or control over one's actions. In Freedom Beyond Sovereignty, Sharon R Krause shows that individual agency is best conceived as a non-sovereign experience because our ability to act and affect the world depends on how other people interpret and respond to what we do. The intersubjective character of agency makes it vulnerable to the effects of social inequality, but it is never in a strict sense socially determined. The agency of the oppressed sometimes surprises us with its vitality. Only by understanding the deep dynamics of agency as simultaneously non-sovereign and robust can we remediate the failed freedom of those on the losing end of persistent inequalities and grasp the scope of our own responsibility for social change. Freedom Beyond Sovereignty brings the experiences of the oppressed to the center of political theory and the study of freedom. It fundamentally reconstructs liberal individualism and enables us to see human action, personal responsibility, and the meaning of liberty in a totally new light.

Must we put passions aside when we deliberate about justice? Can we do so? The dominant views of deliberation rightly emphasize the importance of impartiality as a cornerstone of fair decision making, but they wrongly assume that impartiality means being disengaged and passionless. In Civil Passions, Sharon Krause argues that moral and political deliberation must incorporate passions, even as she insists on the value of impartiality. Drawing on resources ranging from Hume's theory of moral sentiment to recent findings in neuroscience, Civil Passions breaks new ground by providing a systematic account of how passions can generate an impartial standpoint that yields binding and compelling conclusions in politics. Krause shows that the path to genuinely impartial justice in the public sphere--and ultimately to social change and political reform--runs through moral sentiment properly construed. This new account of affective but impartial judgment calls for a politics of liberal rights and democratic contestation, and it requires us to reconceive the meaning of public reason, the nature of sound deliberation, and the authority of law. By illuminating how impartiality feels, Civil Passions offers not only a truer account of how we deliberate about justice, but one that promises to engage citizens more effectively in acting for justice.

Why do men and women sometimes risk everything to defend their liberties? What motivates principled opposition to the abuse of power? In "Liberalism with Honor," Sharon Krause explores honor as a motive for risky and difficult forms of political action. She shows the sense of honor to be an important source of such action and a spring of individual agency more generally.

Krause traces the genealogy of honor, including its ties to conscientious objection and civil disobedience, beginning in old-regime France and culminating in the American civil rights movement. She examines the dangers intrinsic to honor and the tensions between honor and modern democracy, but demonstrates that the sense of honor has supported political agency in the United States from the founders to democratic reformers such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Martin Luther King, Jr.

Honor continues to hold interest and importance today because it combines self-concern and personal ambition with principled higher purposes, and so challenges the disabling dichotomy between self-interest and self-sacrifice that currently pervades both political theory and American public life.

Two generations of students inspired by Harvey Mansfield come together here to demonstrate how their diverse approaches illuminate the topic of the arts of rule and speak to the wide scope of Mansfield's contributions. The essays collected here cover both ancient and modern ground. The first section covers topics such as Xenophon's question of what it is to be a gentleman, Aristotle's view of friendship, Montaigne's account of the highest good, and Montesquieu's elevation of modesty. The second section engages Machiavelli's political theory and its influence on subsequent thinkers, such as Bacon, Hobbes, and Hume. Authors in the third section examine the sources, conditions, and practices of freedom in the context of modern politics, drawing on writers from Shakespeare to Tocqueville to shed light on contemporary debates. The arts of rule cover the exercise of power by princes and popular sovereigns, but they range beyond the domain of government itself, extending to civil associations, political parties, and religious institutions. Artful rule both directs the use of authority toward a specific end and posits a more comprehensive vision of the best way of life for human beings. Making full use of political philosophy and benefiting from a range of backgrounds, this collection recognizes that although the arts of rule are comprehensive, the best government is a limited one.

Two generations of students inspired by Harvey Mansfield come together here to demonstrate how their diverse approaches illuminate the topic of the arts of rule and speak to the wide scope of Mansfield's contributions. The essays collected here cover both ancient and modern ground. The first section covers topics such as Xenophon's question of what it is to be a gentleman, Aristotle's view of friendship, Montaigne's account of the highest good, and Montesquieu's elevation of modesty. The second section engages Machiavelli's political theory and its influence on subsequent thinkers, such as Bacon, Hobbes, and Hume. Authors in the third section examine the sources, conditions, and practices of freedom in the context of modern politics, drawing on writers from Shakespeare to Tocqueville to shed light on contemporary debates. The arts of rule cover the exercise of power by princes and popular sovereigns, but they range beyond the domain of government itself, extending to civil associations, political parties, and religious institutions. Artful rule both directs the use of authority toward a specific end and posits a more comprehensive vision of the best way of life for human beings. Making full use of political philosophy and benefiting from a range of backgrounds, this collection recognizes that although the arts of rule are comprehensive, the best government is a limited one.