The period of English history between the second Civil War and the Restoration opened up seemingly unlimited possibilities for shaping the country�s future. The period likewise witnessed an unprecedented surge of political imagination, a development which is particularly visible in Interregnum utopianism. More than ever before, utopianism orientates itself to a hopeful and expectant reality. It is no longer fictional or contemplative. Its ambitions and fulfilment are political; there is a drive towards active political participation. Utopianism reshapes its former boundaries and reinvents itself as reality utopianism. Considering this new reality-orientated identity, the utopias of the 1650s are especially useful in providing an insight into the political imagination of this period. This thesis studies three reality utopias of the 1650s: Winstanley�s The Law of Freedom, Harrington�s Oceana and Hobbes�s Leviathan. Each work represents a uniquely different utopian vision: Winstanley imagines an agrarian communism, Harrington revives classical republicanism, and Hobbes stresses absolute sovereignty. These three different utopian visions not only illustrate the range of the political imagination; they provide an opportunity to examine different ways to deal with the existing political and social concerns of the Interregnum and different perspectives for ideal solutions. Interregnum utopianism is shaped by the expectations and violence of the English Revolution and accordingly it is characterised by the heightened hopes and fears of its time. Despite substantial differences in the three utopias, the elemental hopes and fears expressed in these works remain similar. The hope for change and a better future is negotiated textually with a fear of anarchy and violence. In the end a compromise between opportunity and security has to be found. It is this compromise that shapes the face of Interregnum utopianism and reflects a major aspect of the post-revolutionary political imagination in England.

La filosofía política de Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) tiene como fundamento último una teología política que deduce del cristianismo el fundamento del poder absoluto del soberano. A esta altura del estado del arte, esto no resulta nada nuevo, y la importante literatura al respecto, que mencionaremos más adelante, así lo demuestra, lo que no deja de sorprender en un pensador que fue considerado por mucho tiempo como un ateo. Sin embargo, nos parece que el uso que hace Hobbes de las Escrituras es muchas veces incorrecto, inadecuado, reductor y acomodaticio, dejando fuera aspectos esenciales del cristianismo y, destacando sólo aquellos que les sirven para sus propósitos. De forma tal, que, por un lado, su teología política es discutible, y, por otro, su interpretación de las Escrituras acrecienta, en vez de disminuir, su fama de ateo. En consecuencia, pensamos, que es necesario realizar un análisis crítico del lugar que ocupa la religión, y el cristianismo, en su sistema de ideas para apreciar lo bien o mal fundada que resulta su filosofía política cuando a los argumentos filosóficos se agregan los teológicos. Éste será nuestro aporte al tema, la crítica a los fundamentos de su teología política. Creemos que Hobbes hace un uso abusivo de las Escrituras para darle un fundamento religioso a su política, de esta forma, pretende darle una mayor fuerza persuasiva a sus escritos, y un fundamento superior a su filosofía política. Ésta es nuestra tesis. Nuestra estudio, en consecuencia, tiene como propósito analizar la relación entre religión y política en la filosofía de Thomas Hobbes con el fin de evaluar el lugar que la religión ocupa en su filosofía política, al punto de que se pueda hablar de la existencia de una teología política en su filosofía. Entendemos por teología política, una política cuyos fundamentos son religiosos o teológicos.

This paper is a case study on Bradley E. Manning, famous for leaking classified intelligence to media, or in the charge sheet’s words: “knowingly give intelligence to the enemy, through indirect means.” My opinion is that this sort of dilemma is a question of values, how you view the world and, most important of all, human rights and the philosophy of rights. Therefore I decided to sort out the arguments regarding the issue of freedom of speech versus the state’s need for protection. To do this I performed a pro et contra analysis from John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty and Thomas Hobbes’ Leviathan, this building my theory on which I lean my other work upon. Furthermore, I performed a case study on Manning where I compared the charges and the defense with the arguments of Mill and Hobbes. Ergo: I applied my theory on an existing conflict between freedom of speech and the state’s need for protection to see which arguments that are used in the charge against Manning and if one could derive this from the argumentation analysis consistent of Mill and Hobbes.   Words: 11474

Abstract: The purpose of this essay is to analyze how populist parties argue for state authority in a way that resembles Thomas Hobbes’s arguments in Leviathan. Moreover, the essay analyzes the characteristics of human nature studied by Thomas Hobbes connecting it to the importance of the National State. The parties analyzed are Sweden Democrats from Sweden, VOX from Spain and Jobbik from Hungary. The research questions are: 1)How do populist parties argue for state authority?  2) How do their arguments resemble Thomas Hobbes’s arguments for state authority in Leviathan? The theories used are related to the study of Thomas Hobbes described in Chapter 13 and 29 in Leviathan related to human nature and state of authority. Moreover, Cas Mudde and Hellström’s theories are used related to populist parties on the right. The method used is a qualitative method which includes an argumentative analysis which aims to explain the essay’s purposes. In conclusion, the analyzed populist parties share the ideas of Thomas Hobbes related to the state of authority and the decrease of corporations in the National State. In other words, the populist parties argue that the national state must be unity and solid in order to defend its own interest and citizens’ interests.

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In this thesis I will offer an extended discussion and critique of an important social constructivist book, Steven Shapin and Simon Schaffer's Leviathan and the Air-Pump (1985), focusing on its reception and its standing in science and technology studies in the fifteen years since its publication. This work claims to be an "origins" story for the modern form of life that we now call the scientific community, and this claim has not itself been contested strongly by other scholars. Central to Shapin and Schaffer's argument for the socially constructed nature of scientific knowledge, is the contrast they find between the community orientation of Robert Boyle and the anti-community stance of Thomas Hobbes. In the course of this thesis, I question the validity not only of this contrast, but of the origins story itself. I suggest that while experimental, communally-practiced science and modernity did emerge together around the end of the seventeenth-century, the qualities of science that Shapin and Schaffer suggest are distinctive of modern science might more accurately be represented as distinctive of modern science. In other words, I suggest that the story of Leviathan and the Air-Pump is not so much an origins story for science as it is emblematic of the early influence of widespread European modernist culture on scientific practices. Leviathan and the Air-Pump is an important case to study in order to unravel the strands of science and modernity because it occupies simultaneously both the early and late margins of the modern period: first, by taking the contested but emergent modernism represented by Robert Boyle as its subject and, second, as a work of scholarship that sits on the far margins of the modern period. My method is to treat Shapin and Schaffer's work as a central primary source for understanding how contemporary science and technology studies scholarship deals with early modern science. A side product of this analysis is to suggest strongly that Shapin and Schaffer's account of the social construction of scientific knowledge is itself socially constructed: that is, it is highly selective in its presentation and interpretation of historical evidence. I also consider what the implications may be for separating modernity from science, and for thinking about how science might be practiced in the age that will follow -- perhaps is already following -- the modern period. / Master of Science

Max Moritz   Uppsatsens syfte är att undersöka om Facebooks community-sida bygger på skäliga principer för dess användare, vilka rättigheter och skyldigheter dessa har och om ett skäligt samarbetssystem kan upprättas på community-sidan. För att besvara uppsatsens frågeställningar används John Rawls tankemodell ursprungspositionen som appliceras på principerna. Uppsatsens teoretiska grund byggs utifrån John Rawls teori rättvisa som skälighet och Thomas Hobbes Leviathan, för att visa på hur Facebook kan definieras som ett digitalt samhälle och därmed bli ett föremål för den här typen av undersökning. Uppsatsen belyser också de förändringar som skett på webben och sätter förändringen i relation till uppsatsen.   Resultatet visar att community-sidan bygger på skäliga principer, att användarna har en rättighet att inte behöva utsättas för trakasserier, välja vem som ser inlägg man gör, välja innehåll man vill se, anmäla innehåll och att förmedla sin åsikt till andra användare. Resultatet visar också att användarna har en skyldighet att inte utsätta någon för trakasserier eller mobbning, inte konspirera eller uppmana till våldsbrott, att tänka sin målgrupp och anpassa budskapet med hänsyn i åtanke. Resultatet visar också på att community-sidan kan sägas lägga grunden för ett skäligt samarbetssystem mellan användarna.

Les romans City of Glass et Leviathan de l'auteur états-unien Paul Auster mettent en scène deux types d'espace bien distincts en perpétuelle tension. Le lieu clos de l'écriture, refuge privilégié pour les écrivains, précède l'espace ouvert urbain dans lequel les protagonistes choisissent éventuellement de se propulser, et lui fait face. À l'intérieur de ce nouvel espace comparable à un labyrinthe, les écrivains connaissent une transformation marquée et irréversible. L'objectif de ce mémoire est de révéler comment la dichotomie des espaces permet d'expliquer la mutation subie par les personnages. L'originalité du projet vient du fait qu'il s'agit probablement de la première étude à faire un lien entre la configuration spatiale des romans d'Auster et le processus de métamorphose et de dégradation traversé par les personnages. Il s'agit aussi de la première recherche à qualifier la chute et le destin funeste des protagonistes, pourtant largement abordés par les critiques, de devenir-monstre. Les notions d'une herméneutique des espaces romanesques servent de cadre théorique afin d'évaluer la construction spatiale des œuvres, élément clé de la problématique de cette analyse. Cette première partie de l'étude se voit prolongée et renforcée par la théorie de la déterritorialisation, puisque les personnages passent d'un contexte spatial à un autre, ainsi que par une observation de la crise existentielle vécue par les protagonistes pendant leur aventure. Le recours au mythe grec de Thésée en tant que référence pour saisir les motifs associés à l'imaginaire du labyrinthe permet également de poser un regard mieux orienté sur le sort qui attend les héros dans le dédale austérien. Dédoublement identitaire, perte du statut de sujet, hybridité, altération de la connaissance de soi et métamorphose en monstre sont autant de répercussions qui attendent les personnages délaissant leur pièce d'écriture pour s'engager dans l'hostile labyrinthe. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : Paul Auster, espace romanesque, écrivain, labyrinthe, métamorphose, monstre, City of Glass, Leviathan.

Nous examinons d’abord les aspects de la souveraineté politique sur la scène shakespearienne. À la lumière des analyses consacrées par Walter Benjamin au drame baroque, en 1928, et de la réaction de Carl Schmitt dans Hamlet ou Hécube (1956), nous montrons que Shakespeare met en scène la mortalité des corps politiques et la souveraineté nouvelle de l’intrigant dans le temps terrestre. Sommé de maîtriser l’art et le tempo de l’intrigue, le Prince est néanmoins impuissant à empêcher la décomposition de l’État. En prenant appui sur le drame élisabéthain, notamment sur le vertige mélancolique et sceptique d’Hamlet, nous interrogeons alors l’effort contemporain en vue de l’ordre et de la synchronisation dans la cité. La théorie hobbesienne de la représentation politique et juridique moderne rompt avec la conception mystique de l’unité politique et toute écriture inspirée des lois, tandis que la scène civile y est dédiée à la paix du commerce entre les individus afin de garantir les conditions d’une autonomie réelle dans la sphère privée. Réciproquement, cette autonomie doit pérenniser les solutions à la mélancolie et au scepticisme conceptualisées dans Léviathan. Tout en entérinant la tragédie de l’existence humaine et de tout savoir déjà mise en scène par Shakespeare, Léviathan évite d’emblée l’exaltation schmittienne ainsi que la violence « pure » logée, selon Benjamin, dans l’état d’exception de la subjectivité. À travers les spectres qui, chez Hobbes, n’ont plus droit de cité, la scène shakespearienne défait cependant les mécanismes de l’ordre et de la synchronisation continus, cela sans congédier le droit ni le projet de l’autonomie. / First, we examine the aspects of the political sovereignty on the Shakespearean stage. In the light of Walter Benjamin’s Origin of the German baroque drama (1928) and of Carl Schmitt’s answer to Benjamin in Hamlet or Hecuba (1956), we show that Shakespeare stages the mortality of the political bodies and the new sovereignty of the plotter. Urged to master the art and the tempo of the plot, the prince is nonetheless unable to prevent the decomposition of the state. Then, drawing on the Elizabethan drama, and especially on Hamlet, we question the contemporary effort towards order and synchronization within the city. Hobbes’s theory of political and juridical representation breaks with the mystical conception of political unity and with any inspired legislation, whereas the civil scene is dedicated to the peace between individuals in order to ensure the possibility of a real autonomy in the private sphere. Reciprocally, this autonomy must consolidate the solutions to the problems of melancholy and skepticism conceptualized in Leviathan. While endorsing the tragedy of human condition and of knowledge already put on stage by Shakespeare, Leviathan prevents Schmitt’s exaltation as well as the « pure » violence which, according to Benjamin, lies in the subject’s state of exception. Yet, through the ghosts that Leviathan cannot tolerate within the public sphere, the Shakespearean stage unravels the mechanisms of perpetual order and synchronization without rejecting the law and the project of autonomy.

[pt] Na teoria político-jurídica, o Leviathan é o monstro que a assombra. É possível, contudo, uma leitura da obra de Hobbes que evite esta assombração: que revele uma concepção da ideia de soberania sem as mitificações que o conceito geralmente traz consigo. É possível até perceber uma certa ironia na filosofia hobbesiana, que devolve esta assombração ao próprio leitor quando este encara a soberania como tabu. Isto, pois, a partir de um resgate da filosofia primeira de Hobbes, obtemos várias estratégias que permitem desconstruir discursos de autoridade. E Hobbes faz isto para refutar as dos que, em geral, consideram-se mais sábios que os outros, como escolásticos, juristas e cientistas. Com isto, ou haveria uma enorme contradição em sua teoria política, ou um sentido oculto que, ao mesmo tempo que propõe a autoridade, rebaixa-a a um mero tabu. Adotando a segunda hipótese, obtemos uma teoria para refutar discursos que fundamentam a autoridade em categorias transcendentais ou logocêntricas. Esta refutação pode ter aplicações no contexto político atual, pois a utilização de tais categorias é recorrente para impor limites à democracia. Ao mesmo tempo, eliminando a mitificação da soberania, Hobbes permite enxergá-la apenas como os pontos de conexão inicial e final de um sistema concebido para obter decisões políticas, o que, em uma democracia, como o filósofo propõe, deve ser o próprio demos. É a partir desta releitura de Hobbes que o presente trabalho apresenta estas conclusões, ao mesmo tempo que refuta uma interpretação tradicional de sua filosofia, que o vê apenas como mais um jusnaturalista. / [en] In legal and political theory, Leviathan is its scary monster. However another reading is possible; a reading that avoids that dread: one that reaveals a concept of sovereignty without all the mythifications that it usually brings together. It s even possible to sense a certain hobbesian irony which shows that the dread was within the reader himself when he faces sovereignty as a taboo. This becomes possible when we rescue Hobbes first philosophy, recovering many strategies proposed by the philosopher that allow us to deconstruct discourses of authority. And Hobbes does that to refute those that, in general, consider themselves wiser than the others, like scholars, jurists and scientists. By that reading, either there is a big contradiction in Hobbes political theory, or a hidden meaning, namely, that, at the same time Hobbes proposes the sovereign authority, he demotes it to a mere taboo. Adopting the latter, we obtain a theory that makes possible to rebut authority discourses based on transcendental and logocentric categories. This rebuttal may be applied in contemporary political contexts, as those categories are recurringly used to impose limits on democracy. At the same time, by demythifying sovereignty, Hobbes allows us perceive it only as an initial and terminal nodal connector in a system conceived to extract political decisions, one that in a democracy must be the demos itself. It s by this reading of Hobbes philosophy that this work presents its conclusions and at the same time refutes a traditional intepretation of the same: one that perceives Hobbes only as another natural law philosopher.