Time, modernity and space

Montesquieu’s and Constant’s ancient/modern binaries

Bibliographic Data

ID11344914
AuthorsManjeet Ramgotra (SOAS University of London, corresponding author)
Year2022
Volume48
Issue3
Pages263-279
Publication date2022-04-03
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHistory of European Ideas (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0191-6599 • E-ISSN: 1873-541X
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/01916599.2022.2056335
OpenAlexW4220927200
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited13

This article explores how our thinking about time shapes epistemological and ontological understandings of the world. It considers the idea of modernity as constituted by the ancient/modern binary through an examination of Montesquieu’s and Benjamin Constant’s development of this binary in relation to their understandings of commerce, the law of nations and conquest, political rule and freedom in the context of European colonial empire. Modernity demarcates a break in (historical) time between a past and a present that extends into a future. This rupture plays a role in distinctions between modern European and pre-modern non-European societies. The ancient/modern binary underpins conceptions of collective and individual liberty. It associates modernity with individual liberty, progress, reason and science. I analyse how this binary operated across space to categorise various societies as not modern, pre-modern or less developed according to levels of scientific, technological, political and economic progress in Montesquieu’s thought and through Constant’s silences. This article develops an innovative reading of the ancient/modern binary in French political thought

Archaeology · Art · Colonialism · Context (archaeology · Empire · Epistemology · Literature · Modernity · Political science · Politics · Sociology · European Political History Analysis · Hannah Arendt's Political Philosophy · History · Law · Philosophy · Political Theory and Influence

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