Harold Laski, born in England at the end of the Nineteenth-century, is a theorist who helped shape political thought throughout much of the first half of the Twentieth-century. Primarily recognized for his contribution to the British pluralist tradition, arguing against state sovereignty and advocating devolution of political power to non-state organizations, Laski's latest writings focused on the relation between capitalism and the sovereign state. This book explores both Laksi's pluralist thinking as well as his later writings on the problems of maintaining and developing democracy and freedom both within and in the relations between capitalist societies. Lamb seeks to explore Laski's work on international politics and its continuing significance to the understanding of politics and the state today.

The topic of sovereignty is contentious, and one of enduring interest. In a world of ever increasing economic globalisation, the rise of supranational regulation and the interconnected age of information and communication technology, among many other developments, have challenged the once exclusively held Westphalian model of sovereignty. The distinction between the internal aspect of sovereignty as expressed in terms of ultimate authority in a constitution, and the external aspect involving the relationship between sovereign states has been blurred. This has given rise to contemporary debates that explore the theoretical and practical implications of current challenges to established doctrines. Evidently no book could encompass the entirety of the contemporary debates on sovereignty. This is a book of essays focusing on sovereignty by a team of leading writers contributing domestic, European and international perspectives. The essays have been written at a time of very great testing of the institutional frameworks at every level: domestic, European, international or global. The book illuminates the enduring strength of sovereignty as a foundational concept and the continuing widespread appeal of sovereignty as an idea.

First published in 1977 this book is both expository and critical and concentres on Hobbes' ethical and political theory, but also considering the effect on these of his metaphysics. Updated, with a new preface especially for this re-issue, which brings together recent scholarship on Hobbes, a particular useful feature of the book is the new, critical bibliography.

Public Law Text, Cases, and Materials explores how the law works in practice. The key institutions, legal principles, and conventions that underpin the public law of the UK are brought to life through the inclusion of extracts from key sources, which are explained and critiqued by the authors.

This book examines how sovereignty works in the context of European integration and postcolonialism. Focusing on a group of micro-polities associated with the European Union, it offers a new understanding of international relations in the context of modern sovereignty. This book offers a systematic and comparative analysis of the Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs), the EU and the four affected Member States: UK, France, the Netherlands and Denmark. Contributors explore how states and state-like entities play ‘sovereignty games’ to understand how a group of postcolonial entities may strategically use their ambiguous status in relation to sovereignty. The book examines why former colonies are seeking greater room to manoeuvre on their own, whilst simultaneously developing a close relationship to the supranational EU. Methodologically sophisticated, this interdisciplinary volume combines interviews, participant observation, textual, legal and institutional analysis for a new theoretical approach to understanding the strategic possibilities and subjectivity of non-sovereign entities in international politics. Bringing together research on European integration and postcolonial theory, European Integration and Postcolonial Sovereignty Games will be of interest to students and scholars of International Relations, EU studies, Postcolonial studies, International Law and Political Theory.

A team of leading scholars survey the development of philosophy in the period of extraordinary intellectual change from the mid-16th century to the early 18th century. They cover metaphysics and natural philosophy; the mind, the passions, and aesthetics; epistemology, logic, mathematics, and language; ethics and political philosophy; and religion.

Remarks on political philosophy -- Lectures on Hobbes -- Lectures on Locke -- Lectures on Hume -- Lectures on Rousseau -- Lectures on Mill -- Lectures on Marx.

A History of Western Political Thought is an energetic and lucid account of the most important political thinkers and the enduring themes of the last two and a half millennia. Written with students of the history of political thought in mind, the book: * traces the development of political thought from Ancient Greece to the late twentieth century * focuses on individual thinkers and texts * includes 40 biographies of key political thinkers * offers original views of theorists and highlights those which may have been unjustly neglected * develops the wider themes of political thought and the relations between thinkers over time.

This collection of articles brings together a selection of previously published work on Agamben‘s thought in relation to law and gathered from within the legal field and theory in particular. The volume offers an exemplary range of varied readings, reflections and approaches which are of interest to readers, students and researchers of Agamben‘s law-related work.