The Cambridge School

First Among Equals — Harvard University Press An incisive account of how equality transformed from an abstract ideal into a concrete social and political vision, thanks to seventeenth-century English dissidents like the Levellers and the politica...

My second book, First Among Equals, is now up on the HUP website. Can’t wait till it’s finally out in the world this October!

www.hup.harvard.edu/books/978067...

On Adam Smith's Machiavellian (and Humean) functional criticism of Burkean style explanations In today’s post I want to tie two streams of my recent digressions together.

On Adam Smith's Machiavellian (and Humean) functional criticism of Burkean style explanations
open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

Meaning and Understanding in the History of Ideas and Beyond | Home

Meaning and Understanding in the History of Ideas and Beyond, edited by Adrian Blau, celebrates the 50th anniversary of Quentin Skinner’s seminal essay.

@adrianblau.bsky.social

Now Open Access:

www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/book/10....

It's tomorrow! Join us at Christ's College at 5:30 for a talk by the legendary Prof Gloria Wekker, "Still Crazy After All Those Years: Revisiting Intersectionality." All welcome, drinks to follow! www.gender.cam.ac.uk/Events/vplec...

On Smith's Machiavellian defense of Standing Armies Liberty fund just published an invited post, "Innovation and Governance in Book 1 of Wealth of Nations," (here) to mark the 250th anniversary of the publication of Wealth of Nations today!

On Smith's Machiavellian defense of Standing Armies with a shout out to @aoprea.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

POST-DOC!

3-year job in history of political thought / visual culture / art history
Department of Politics & International Studies
University of Cambridge
@thecambridgeschool.bsky.social

www.jobs.cam.ac.uk/job/54724/

Meaning and Understanding in the History of Ideas and Beyond | Home Adrian Blau is Professor of Politics at King’s College London. His research interests include the history of political thought and other issues in political theory/philosophy, including corruption, democracy and rationality.

A reassessment of Quentin Skinner's classic paper on its 50th anniversary, drawn from a @britishacademy.bsky.social conference - Meaning and Understanding in the History of Ideas and Beyond, edited by @adrianblau.bsky.social & open access at www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/book/10....

On Prudential Liberalism, and the New International Order pt. III The previous two posts in this series were published some time ago (here; and here). When liberalism was invented as a political and ideological doctrine at the tail end of the eighteenth century in E...

On Prudential Liberalism, and the New International Order pt. III with a shout out to @chrisbrooke.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

JOB

Assistant Professor of Political Theory
University of Cambridge
@thecambridgeschool.bsky.social

www.cam.ac.uk/jobs/univers...

On Hume's counterintuitive theory of taxes [T]hat we have, with regard to taxes, an instance of what frequently happens in political institutions, that the consequences of things are diametrically opposite to what we should expect on the first...

On Hume's counterintuitive theory of taxes
open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

The cover of a book by Peter Stacey entitled "The State in Machiavelli" in the series Ideas in Context

Soon in print! www.cambridge.org/core/books/s...

Here's Stuart White (Oxford) speaking in Utrecht on the important business of Rousseau and cats.

The Betty Behrens Seminar series returns next Thursday, 26 Feb., at Clare Hall, Cambridge. Y.M. Choueiri, A. Wallace-Hadrill and E. Griffin will treat, in turn, Abd al-Rahman al-Jabarti, Suetonius and E.P. Thompson.

@davidecadeddu.bsky.social @clarehallcambridge.bsky.social

Learned much last night from @chrisbrooke.bsky.social on beavers and socialism.

I’ve requested that the eventual paper be titled “Red in Tooth and Claw”.

On Hume's account of the origin of democratic despotism It is well known, perhaps even to my readers, that Hume was quite interested in Montesquieu’s The Spirit of the Laws (1748) when it was on the (printer’s) anvil.

On Hume's account of the origin of democratic despotism
open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

A book sits on a wooden shelf with a vase behind it. On the red cover three Doric columns are topped by the texts Plato: A civic life: Carol Atack

The paperback of my 'Plato: a civic life' will be published on March 1st. I'll be doing some more talks and podcasts in support, and will add details to this thread as they're confirmed. More info and a pre-order link here: reaktionbooks.co.uk/work/plato

Utopia Abstract. Ideal societies, better worlds, more just and peaceful ways of living: these have long been the stuff of human beings’ social dreaming. In this c

NEW BOOK!

I'm very happy to say that my new book, Utopia, co-written with Douglas Mao, has been published on-line

academic.oup.com/book/62279

Adam Smith on Good Public Management The prudent man is not willing to subject himself to any responsibility which his duty does not impose upon him.

Adam Smith on Good Public Management
open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

John Dunn: Can Democracy be Rehabilitated? (Lecture Part) - Sakuradakai Lecture at Keio University YouTube video by 一般財団法人 櫻田會 -Sakuradakai Foundation-

For those who could not join us in Tokyo, there is now a recording available of John Dunn's Sakurada-kai Lecture, "Can Democracy be Rehabilitated?" at Keio. The print version is forthcoming @global-ih.bsky.social; I am just handling final edits. Here is the video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMPr...

Academics discussing art.

Daniele Palmer (chair), Katie Ebner-Landy (presenter), and Malcolm Bull (commentator) at the #MondaySeminar, discussing the purpose of art.

It was a great experience to be at the University of Freiburg to discuss “The Significance of the Cambridge School for Contemporary Political Theory”. Three generations of Cambridge scholars debating with many great colleagues from all over the world about new exciting directions in the field

I'll be working on an entry on #Montesquieu for the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy in the coming months. If you have any recommendations about secondary readings the biblio absolutely must include (especially French language ones), I'm all ears! #poltheory

The Carlyle Lectures The Shape of Democracy - Jill Frank (President White Professor of History & Political Science, Cornell University)

Jill Frank gives the first Carlyle lecture tuesday at Oxford. www.history.ox.ac.uk/carlyle-lect...

Bauer imagines a peculiar kind of state -a philosophical ideal of a state, a state as it has never existed and could never exist, a state in which the Sovereign gives public lectures on logic and metaphysics, and in which all the citizens, from the Chief Minister down to the lamp cleaner of the Royal Theater take notes, like Chinese mandarins, of every word uttered by the crowned Professor, so as to make sure that every executive act will be in accordance with what was written down in their school notebook.

Have never noticed this before. Karl Marx, in The Holy Family, lampooning what we now call 'Ideal Theory'.

Sagnik Dutta, explaining things.

Sagnik Dutta (Tiburg) kicks off the Lent Term #MondaySeminar in fine style discussing ethnographic approaches to the study of minority rights in India (with Tobias Müller commentating and Annabel Brett in the chair).

On Publius on Democratic Despotism An ELECTIVE DESPOTISM was not the government we fought for; but one which should not only be founded on free principles, but in which the powers of government should be so divided and balanced among s...

On Publius On Democratic Despotism
open.substack.com/pub/digressi...

Lawrence Hamilton, "Representative Democracy Against Oligarchy," New Political Science (2025)

@thecambridgeschool.bsky.social

read.dukeupress.edu/nps/article/...

The after-dinner talks are always the most fun.

Got to my office to find a treat for the archives fellow from @stuartjones.bsky.social on James Bryce: the first nonconformist student @trinityoxford.bsky.social who went on to be jurist, politician, diplomat, and is now in the dining hall as well as on this cover. Congratulations Stuart!

A photograph of Foucault sitting at a desk with bookshelves behind and a typewriter and papers in front of him. There is a large old-fashioned lampshade above him.

Foucault’s Christmas - "a Christmas day without writing, that was impossible! ... a day when, as he said, 'nothing has happened for several thousand years' " progressivegeographies.com/2024/12/25/f...