Distribution of Power and a Political Change in David Hume’s Poltical Theory
- Institution: Mazovian Public University in Płock
- ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4504-7625
- Year of publication: 2019
- Source: Show
- Pages: 195-208
- DOI Address: https://doi.org/10.15804/siip201911
- PDF: siip/18/siip1811.pdf
In this paper I would like to present an interpretation of David Hume’s political theory. Therefore, a method of investigation can be recognized as hermeneutical one. Main threads which I would like to emphasize are: concept of stability, distribution of power, role of an opinion in political dimension and a conservative attitude toward a change. I claim that important lesson for political science can be taken from his theory. Generally speaking, this lesson consists in refusing the so-called political regime fetishism and focusing on the relevant issues of social stability. These issues are strictly determined by the opinions, hence the proper subject-matter of political science is identified with them. As one of the conclusions I propose a thesis that politics is, and ought only to be slave of opinions, what is an allusion to a famous sentence from A Treatise of Human Nature that the reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions.