I’m sorry to disturb, but I’m worrried by the last comment. I fear that someone may take Margaret’s comment as a reason to put an end to the conversation, and that a hurried visitor who would be tempted to jump to conclusions, would leave the blogspot without having tried to really consider the underlying ones. The fact is I respect these conclusions, and I encourage constructive comments as well as I can understand that one can feel sorry about the way opposition to such an effort of reflection leading to them is expressed. But it must be known that serious couterargument has been crafted by Acarr (http://chasingthenorm.blogspot.com/2008/10/philosophical-journey.html) responding in part to the requirement of consistency that is cogent to moral responsability (virtue, according to some).
There is some evidence that a choice ought to be made between community and virtue according to him.
Altough he fails to justify this beleif, it seems to me to be a serious path to consider. In a way we could relate Nicola’s stance to Rousseau’s love for feeling towards others, joint to his impression that sharing rules of conduct is the only way towards security. But Hobbes objected that rules could be effective only if they are applied by absolute power, otherwise they will be distracted from their goal by irrational but natural preference for thyself.
Both are stucked in a tension between an aspiration to order and a desire for “reform”.
Altough I disagree about Hobbes motives and am ambivalent about Rousseau’s, I dont know if motives can be the only source of approbation or rejection of a political theory or doctrine. It seems to me that if we want protection for (the body of) the people (that we love) and encouragement to achieve great things as individuals and/or collectively, we must confer some power to delegates to organise these matters at the national level. “Incentives” is the word for the tools that help us manage our behviours in a righteous manner, though nothing in thaht strategy refrains us from doing more to promote betterment of the international situation on the global level. Many occasions exist for sharing views on what we expect of life and how we can achieve it together, without having to put down the government to do so. The state is a tool to redirect people’s energy towards greater ends than the domestic tasks.
So I would be curious to read Nicola’s reaction to Acarr’s objection and to my social-democratic stance.
And I thank Margaret for stimulating me to extend the life of this fascinating conversation, even though it may be in a way that could seem a regress (towards moderate liberalism, I hope).

I wish to say that I dont want Nicola to feel any obligation to take a different stance than the one he believes in (and seems to have changed slightly since). And I noticed that he (or she?, according to Acarr…) began by saying that this was not expressing his opinions but the evolution of his reflection on matters such as rationality, the vacuum of values, and the critique of totalitarianism as well as the admiration of what litterature and myhts may bring to the forth, like the spiritual importance of generosity (according to my interpretation of his writing). So I cannot deny the value of this “confession”. And I can accept that the author finishes in an ellusive manner, talking about disdain against the “counterrevolution”. According to Wkipedia (sorry for being naive)

“The word counterrevolutionary is often used interchangeably with reactionary; however, some people considered reactionary (like the CCP)[Communist Party of China] used the term counterrevolutionary to describe their opponents - even if those opponents were advocates of a Marxist revolution. In general, the word “reactionary” is used to describe those who oppose a more long-term trend of social change, while “counterrevolutionaries” are those who oppose a very recent and sudden change.”

I’m not sure about what (s)he refers to: is it only to say he is against the new “New Deal” coming up with the regulation of finance by the state, as well as massive intervention in the economy, or is it to say that he still claims the right… to distanciate himself from the consevatives (who tend to want to come back to a privileged prior state of civilisation)?
Thanks for shedding the light of your mindfull spirit on my bewildered eye.

A french canadian

I loved the essay. Keep up the good work.

1. I happen to know Emmet Kennedy, and I regard him highly. More when next we meet.

2. The list includes Skinner and Pocock. They form one side of an historical debate in which the other side is manned by historians and political scientists influenced by Strauss, notably Paul Rahe, Cary Nederman, and Nathan Tarcov. It’s not a debate I have followed as closely as I should, but, to oversimplify, one of the issues at stake is “Machiavelli, benign bridge from the ancients to modern democracy” (Skinner, Pocock) v. “Machiavelli, malign bridge-dynamiter between ancient and modern” (Strauss, Rahe, Tarcov).

See e.g. Tarcov, “Quentin Skinner’ Method and Machiavelli’s PRINCE,” in James Tully, ed., Meaning and Context: Quentin Skinner and his Critics, Princeton U.Press, 1988