The Crown as Machine
The Crown as Machine
Hobbes and Lord Saye
It is a commonplace to describe the modern state as one where sovereign power is depersonalized by mediating bureaucracies. This chapter offers tangible instances of this phenomenon in early modernity: the Court of Wards and Liveries, through which the crown exercised its feudal rights; and the colonial corporation, which limited the sovereign’s otherwise unfettered power abroad. The political philosophy of Hobbes is set in this context, showing its desire to translate feudal obligation into a modern idiom, one influenced by raison d’état, and to cast the sovereign as akin to the corporation. The career of William Fiennes, Lord Saye and Sele is also set in this context, but his is a markedly different response, being consistently committed to the principle of divided sovereignty. The chapter closes with consideration of the mechanization of the state as it appears in Schmitt’s writings, and in Leo Strauss’ famous critique of them.
Keywords: Thomas Hobbes, Lord Saye and Sele, Court of Wards and Liveries, corporation, Carl Schmitt, Concept of the Political, Leo Strauss
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