In "Natural Rights and the New Republicanism", Michael Zuckert proposes a new view of the political philosophy that lay behind the founding of the United States. In a book that will interest political scientists, historians, and philosophers, Zuckert looks at the Whig or opposition tradition as it developed in England. He argues that there were, in fact, three opposition traditions: Protestant, Grotian, and Lockean. Before the English Civil War the opposition was inspired by the effort to find the 'one true Protestant politics - an effort that was seen to be a failure by the end of the Interregnum period. The Restoration saw the emergence of the Whigs, who sought a way to ground politics free from the sectarian theological-scriptural conflicts of the previous period.The Whigs were particularly influenced by the Dutch natural law philosopher Hugo Grotius. However, as Zuckert shows, by the mid-eighteenth century John Locke had replaced Grotius as the philosopher of the Whigs. Zuckert's analysis concludes with a penetrating examination of John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon, the English 'Cato,' who, he argues, brought together Lockean political philosophy and pre-existing. Whig political science into a new and powerful synthesis. Although it has been misleadingly presented as a separate 'classical republican' tradition in recent scholarly discussions, it is this 'new republicanism' that served as the philosophical point of departure for the founders of the American republic.

作者简介：

迈克尔•扎科特（Michael P. Zuckert） 列奥•斯特劳斯学派重要成员。1974年取得芝加哥大学博士学位，现为美国圣母大学（University of Notre Dame）政治学系教授、主任。研究领域包括政治哲学、美国宪法与理论、美国政治思想等。另著有《自然权利的共和国》（The Natural Rights Republic: Studies in the Foundation of the American Political Tradition）和《开创自由主义：论洛克的政治哲学》（Launching Liberalism: On Lockean Political Philosophy）等，即将出版《完善宪法：南北战争后的修正案》（Completing the Constitution: The Post-Civil War Amendments）。

译者简介：

王岽兴 史学博士，浙江万里学院法学院教师。主要研究方向为美国政治思想史。著有《制度变迁与美国南部的崛起》（浙江人民出版社，2002年）。