Thucydides on the Outbreak of War: Character and Contest
S. N. Jaffe
Abstract
The cause of great power war is a perennial issue for the student of politics. Some 2400 years ago, in his monumental History of the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides wrote that it was the growth of Athenian power and the fear that this power inspired in Sparta which rendered the Peloponnesian War somehow necessary, inevitable, or compulsory. This new political psychological study of Thucydides’ first book shows how the History’s account of the outbreak of the war ultimately points toward the opposing characters of the Athenian and Spartan regimes, disclosing a Thucydidean preoccupation with the d ... More
The cause of great power war is a perennial issue for the student of politics. Some 2400 years ago, in his monumental History of the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides wrote that it was the growth of Athenian power and the fear that this power inspired in Sparta which rendered the Peloponnesian War somehow necessary, inevitable, or compulsory. This new political psychological study of Thucydides’ first book shows how the History’s account of the outbreak of the war ultimately points toward the opposing characters of the Athenian and Spartan regimes, disclosing a Thucydidean preoccupation with the dynamic interplay between nature and convention. The book explores how the character of the contest between Athens and Sparta, or how the outbreak of a particular war, can reveal Thucydides’ own account of the recurring human causes of war and peace. In the final analysis, the political thought of Thucydides proves bound up with his distinctive view of the complex interrelationship between particular events and universal themes.
Keywords:
Athens,
Sparta,
character,
contest,
causes of war,
political psychology,
nature,
convention,
universal,
particular
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2017 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780198716280 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: March 2017 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198716280.001.0001 |
