著者

梅田 百合香

出版者

桃山学院大学

雑誌

桃山学院大学経済経営論集 (ISSN:02869721)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.57, no.3, pp.7-32, 2016-03-03

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Concerning the issue of morality in politics, Machiavelli and Hobbes have often been viewed as "realists," who accepted the evil lurking in human nature as natural and dissociated morality from politics. However, Hobbes himself did not separate politics and morality, and insisted that his political philosophy was also a moral philosophy. This paper examines the logical structure of political and moral theory in Hobbes's Leviathan, focusing on "evil in politics." In Hobbes's moral philosophy, there is no room for evil in politics in the state of nature, meaning the state of a moral vacuum. Evil in politics signifies injustice in society, in other words, intentions or actions that disturb peace in the civil state after a social contract has been made. Hobbes's description of the state of nature demonstrated that peace was the grand foundation for maintaining a society that actualized morality, and could be the criterion of moral judgement for all political actors.