Family Between the Individual and Political Society. A Study On Hobbes’s Theory of the Family

Journal title RIVISTA DI STORIA DELLA FILOSOFIA
Author/s Liang Pang
Publishing Year 2024 Issue 2023/4
Language English Pages 20 P. 560-579 File size 299 KB
DOI 10.3280/SF2023-004003
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In modern Western political thinking, the family does not feature in the relationship between individuals and the State. The article argues that it is Hobbes who made a decisive contribution to this circumstance by making individuals autonomous and denaturalizing the family. He enables individuals to rid themselves of paternal dominion and even reverses the traditional relationship between family and State. Family and State are both essentially artificial, and the first is based on the second. From this point of view, what Hobbes presents is a dynamic state of nature, which makes it possible to answer the criticism of patriarchal thinkers and today’s feminists. Furthermore, the article reveals the significance of Hobbes’s theory of the family for the formation of modern individuals and their political life.

Keywords: family, State, paternal dominion, individual autonomy, Hobbes.

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Liang Pang, Family Between the Individual and Political Society. A Study On Hobbes’s Theory of the Family in "RIVISTA DI STORIA DELLA FILOSOFIA" 4/2023, pp 560-579, DOI: 10.3280/SF2023-004003