The project of retheoretization of political philosophy in E.Voegelin’s A New Science of Politics

Abstract

The article discusses the project of the retheoretization of political science proposed by political philosopher E.Voegelin. By means of retheoretization (restoration) of the classical Platonic and Aristotelian political philosophy, Voegelin attempts to provide an answer to the discredited positivistic worldview of man, politics and history. Voegelin’s political philosophy evaluates critically both the methods and the subject matter of political science, explores the human nature and reality of human existence in society and history, comprehends relations between knowledge and reality, penetrates the sources of the disorder of society, probes the limits of instrumental rationality, and establishes an ontological basis for political epistemology. His aim is to regain a truth of political order that has been lost through the process of modernization. In developing the theme of retheoretization, he distinguishes between classical political philosophy as represented in the works of Plato and Aristotle, on the one hand, and the modern understanding as conceived by positivism on the other. Voegelin argues that modern political science, like modernity in general, is the result of the great Gnostic revolution. Retheoretization, he insists, would return political science to the kind of enterprise founded by Plato and Aristotle, and overcome the effects of positivism with its emphasis on emulating the methods of natural science and establishing a value-free mode of inquiry. The article concludes that all of Voegelin’s topics are part of his overall plan for the restoration of a true science of politics. This plan, as the authors of the article argue, in A New Science of Politics is not only outlined, but also partially implemented, and Vögelin’s work itself is an example of a restored political philosophy.

Keywords:

political science, classical political philosophy, representation, Gnosticism, retheoretization