Bulletin n. 2-3/2013
February 2014
CONTENTS
  • Section A) The theory and practise of the federal states and multi-level systems of government
  • Section B) Global governance and international organizations
  • Section C) Regional integration processes
  • Section D) Federalism as a political idea
    • Gerald Mara
    Possessions Forever: Thucydides and Kant on Peace, War, and Politics
    in Polity , Volume 45, Issue 3 ,  2013 ,  318-346
    Understanding how Thucydides and Kant contribute to the theorization of international politics is of more than historical interest. Kant is the most important resource for political theorists who envisage the reconstruction of international political institutions along constitutionally democratic lines. Yet this broadly Kantian perspective is challenged by critics who underscore the hostile and dangerous character of the world and who often use Thucydides’ History as a counter-Kantian resource. In this article, I try to set their perspectives in conversation and move the discussion beyond a simple restaging of the quarrel between morality and power. I suggest that Thucydides represents politics in a way that is both demanded and frustrated by Kant’s perspective. At the same time, Kant’s project requires us to ask whether Thucydides’ framework is too accommodating of political necessity, and whether the History is too dismissive of possibilities for political improvement.
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