The Beginnings of Modern Political Thought

The book deals with works concerned with modern political thought, as the
contemporary French philosopher Pierre Manent devoted it to philosophers who
were the founding fathers of that thought and its several beginnings.
The first beginning is related to the founder of realistic political thought, the
Italian philosopher Machiavelli. According to the book, the latter broke with
traditional political philosophy, based on moral advice. In his opinion, political
thought depends on its real context, and for this reason, Pierre Manent considers
Machiavelli as the legitimate father of scientific observation in the political field.
The author also considers that the second beginning came with the English
philosopher Hobbes who believes in the necessity of basing political science on
scientific rules, and this bolstered up the first beginning by institutionalizing
political practice for the sake of a contractual political system. The third
beginning, embodied in Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s political philosophy, expresses
the moral vacuum of the Enlightenment man essentially for reasons related to
social upbringing. Human nature, indeed, is good, but the social fabric corrupts
it. For this reason, Rousseau places political particulars in their real contexts, so
that we could infer the break between these beginnings and utopian political
thought.