Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
  1. Home
  2. Search

Refine search

Refine search

Access:
Content type:
Publication date:
Apply   From and To filters
Subject: Show more
Journals Show more
Publishers: Show more
Societies Show more
Series: Show more
Collections: Show more

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

25 results

Page 1 of 2

  • 19 - ‘What Really Happened’

  • from Part III - After Thucydides
  • Edited by Polly Low, University of Durham
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Companion to Thucydides
    Published online:
    02 March 2023
    Print publication:
    09 March 2023, pp 301-316

  • Summary

    Thucydides’ continuing influence in contemporary political debates rests in large part on the perception that he offers a ‘realistic’ portrayal of human nature and of the impact of human nature on the behaviour of both individuals and states. This chapter analyses and contextualizes the two principal varieties of realism that have been attributed to Thucydides. First, the conventional realist reception, which reads Thucydides as a structural analyst of classic power politics. Second, a new political realism, which sees Thucydides as a witness to the complexity of politics and to the tragic consequences of that complexity. Finally, the chapter introduces a third possible mode of responding to the text, which brings back into the frame the question of what should be counted as ‘realistic’ in the first place and insists on ‘the usefulness of anachronism’ rather than the usefulness of lessons on reality.

What Would Socrates Do?
  • Self-Examination, Civic Engagement, and the Politics of Philosophy
  • Joel Alden Schlosser
  • Published online:
    05 August 2014
    Print publication:
    14 July 2014
  • Socrates continues to be an extremely influential force to this day; his work is featured prominently in the work of contemporary thinkers ranging from Hannah Arendt and Leo Strauss, to Michel Foucault and Jacques Rancière. Intervening in this discussion, What Would Socrates Do? reconstructs Socrates' philosophy in ancient Athens to show its promise of empowering citizens and non-citizens alike. By drawing them into collective practices of dialogue and reflection, philosophy can help people to become thinking, acting beings more capable of fully realizing the promises of political life. At the same time, however, Joel Alden Schlosser shows how these practices' commitment to interrogation keeps philosophy at a distance from the democratic status quo, creating a dissonance with conventional forms of politics that opens space for new forms of participation and critical contestation of extant ones.

Page 1 of 2