Rethinking the State in the Age of Globalisation, v. 10 - Catholic Thought and Contemporary Political Theory (Hardcover)

From the time of Jean Bodin and Thomas Hobbes, political theorists have depicted the state as "sovereign" because it holds preeminent authority over all the denizens belonging to its geographically defined territory. From the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 until the beginning of World War I in 1914, the essential responsibities ascribed to the sovereign state were maintaining internal and external security and promoting domestic prosperity. This idea of "the state" in political theory is clearly inadequate to the realities of national governments and international relations at the beginning of the twenty-first century. During the twentieth century, the sovereign state, as a reality and an idea, had been variously challenged from without and within its borders. What will be the direction of the state in the age of globalisation? Can Catholic political thinking contribute to an adequate concept of statehood and government? A group of German and American scholars were asked to explore specific ways in which the intellectual traditions of Catholicism might help our effort to rethink the state. The debate, as represented in the contributions to this book, is guided by the conviction that these intellectual resources will prove valuable to political theorists as they work to revise our understanding of the state.