Talking Politics: HISTORY OF IDEAS

Rousseau on Inequality

Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s Discourse on Inequality (also known as the Second Discourse) tells the story of all human history to answer one simple question: how did we end up in such an unequal world? David explores the steps Rousseau traces in the fall of humankind and asks whether this is a radical alternative to the vision offered by Hobbes or just a variant on it. Is Rousseau really such a nice philosopher? <a href="https://www.aub.edu.lb/fas/cvsp/Documents/DiscourseonInequality.pdf879500092.pdf" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Free online version of text</a><a href="https://www.cambridge.org/gb/academic/subjects/politics-international-relations/texts-political-thought/rousseau-discourses-and-other-early-political-writings-2nd-edition?format=PB&amp;isbn=9781107151246" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Recommended version to purchase</a> Going deeper…<a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Jean-Jacques-Rousseau-Professor-Leo-Damrosch/dp/0618872027" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Leo Damrosch, Jean Jacques Rousseau: Restless Genius (2005)</a><a href="https://www.faber.co.uk/9780571224067-rousseaus-dog.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">David Edmonds and John Eidinow, Rousseau’s Dog (2007)</a><a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/08/01/how-rousseau-predicted-trump" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Pankaj Mishra, ‘How Rousseau predicted Trump’, The New Yorker (2016)</a><a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b008w3xm" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">(Audio) In Our Time, The Social Contract</a> Hosted on Acast. See <a href="https://acast.com/privacy" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="color:grey;" target="_blank">acast.com/privacy</a> for more information.

A new series of talks by David Runciman, in which he explores some of the most important thinkers and prominent ideas lying behind modern politics – from Hobbes to Gandhi, from democracy to patriarchy, from revolution to lock down. Plus, he talks about the crises – revolutions, wars, depressions, pandemics – that generated these new ways of political thinking. From the team that brought you Talking Politics: a history of ideas to help make sense of what’s happening today. Hosted on Acast. See <a href="https://acast.com/privacy" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="color:grey;" target="_blank">acast.com/privacy</a> for more information.