We Have a Firm Foundation 41In the early twentieth century, the most famous of these early texts was
G. H. Sabine’sHistory of Political Theory, originally published in 1937 in North
America, but then reprinted widely up to the end of the twentieth century (see Easton
1953: 249; Gunnell 1987: 19–20). The timing of its publication is significant. Sabine’s
commitment to the moral importance of learning about the development of the
democratic tradition of the West, in the face of 1930’s totalitarianism in both Russia
and Germany, embodies the deep underlying ethical and civic educational purpose
of the historical perspective. Despite the brief methodological fulminations of the
1970s and 1980s, the same idea has lurked as a subtext in histories of political thought
throughout the twentieth century. In fact, those who fulminated most on the method
question have ironically performed a similar normative role in differing historical
circumstances.^26
Before moving onto an account of the ‘two waves’ of debate about the history of
political theory in the twentieth century, it is important to note that the debate also
relates to wider discussions over the history of philosophy. As mentioned, many twen-
tieth century philosophers have often made a rigid distinction between history and
philosophy. In this latter perspective, past philosophers are dealt with in the context
of how far they relate, or come up to the requirements of contemporary philosophy.
The usual assumption is that the present form of philosophy is the most rigorous,
therefore other philosophies must be measured against contemporary strictures. This
has largely been the position of the analytic style of philosophy to the present day. Such
philosophers have a ready answer to the question as to whether philosophy is closely
related to history and that would be a resounding no. History is history andnot
philosophy. However, there are alternative strong philosophical traditions—which
overlap with the history of political theory—namely, the Idealist and hermeneutic
perspectives. Thus, Dilthey, Collingwood, Oakeshott, and Croce provide a very dif-
ferent reading of the relation of history and philosophy. As Collingwood put it, ‘the
right way of investigating mind is by the methods of history’ (Collingwood 1993:
209). The present discussion will not dwell on this larger debate, although the general
character of the analytic response to political theory will be discussed in Part Two.
Turning now to the two waves: thefirstwave developed with theorists such as Leo
Strauss, Eric Voegelin, and Hannah Arendt. Their ideas have in fact gone on echoing—
in a peculiarly decontextualized manner—up to the close of the twentieth century. The
issue that worried these theorists was the decline of politics and political theory. The
context of their reflections was usually the critique of political theory by mainstream
empirical political science (which will also be explored in the next section), as well
as by their deeply personal reactions to German politics and philosophy during the
decades leading up to the Second World War (see Gunnell in Farr and Seidelman
(eds.) 1993: 182). Arendt and Strauss had both been Martin Heidegger’s students in
Germany in the 1920s and agonized over his involvement with National Socialism.
These theorists also intensely admired classical Greek thought. In Strauss and Arendt,
this led to a sense of the critical and moral importance of the great tradition of political
philosophy. However, this conception of tradition was commonly underpinned by a
distinction between classical and modern political philosophy (or the ancients and