The five weeks' government of Prince Max von Baden (Oct.3–Nov. 9, 1918) is of crucial importance in German history, for it signalizes the end of the First World War and Germany's formal achievement of the parliamentary system. A great deal of material was published about it shortly afterwards, usually with a highly polemical purpose. Thus the Amtliche Urkunden zur Vorgeschichte des Waffenstillstandes 1918 published by the Foreign Ministry and the Ministry of the Interior in 1919 (2nd edition, Berlin, 1924), was motivated by the desire to pin responsibility for Germany's armistice request upon the Supreme Command. It succeeded in dispelling the Stab-in-the-Back Legend as far as educated people were concerned, but these proved only an uninfluential minority during the Weimar Republic. The comprehensive Erinnerungen of Prince Max (Berlin, 1927), written with a large staff of collaborators, provided an exceptionally full account of the period, though one necessarily apologetic in tone and reticent about Max's own weaknesses. The case of the Conservative opposition was ably argued by Count Kuno Westarp, the Conservative leader, in his Die Regierung des Prinzen Max von Baden und die Konservative Partei 1918 (Berlin, 1928). These important works all included the publication of primary documents, though they were necessarily selected in an ex parte manner.

My subject is the World Bank and the Third World. The Bank has taken on the overwhelming task of helping the development of the countries we call, for want of a better word, “underdeveloped,” less favored or, to use a kindlier expression, “developing.” In short, the poor countries. My talk will be divided into three chapters. The first will deal with the origins of foreign aid, the second with the present situation and the last with what we should do to improve our procedures, enlarge our sources of income and perfect their use in the developing world.

It was in 1948 that Pierre Cot called for French neutrality in the rapidly developing tension between the communist and non-communist power blocs. But after all Cot, an influential prewar figure of the Radical Party's left wing and Air Minister of the Popular Front Government, had emerged from the war as a staunch communist sympathizer and a leader of the pro-communist Union Progressiste. Consequently, his opposition to the policy of a West European defense coalition — the Brussels Pact — hardly seemed surprising. Outside the sphere of direct communist influence, however, few important voices in France opposed the formation of a West European defense system.

Modern politics is often said to be fundamentally secular, and many who do not say so may find the proposition too obvious to need stating. In a sense, perhaps, it is obvious; but what does it mean? No doubt it is valuable to have a term to describe a society without religion, or one in which common affairs are not religiously directed. But it is odd to suppose that the sheer absence of a characteristic can serve effectively to define a type of society; for one thing, we would need to know what kind of religion was absent, or in what respects religion was lacking, before we could assess what significance this absence could be said to have; for another, to define a society by the absence of a certain feature would seem to point to an intense preoccupation with its presence or absence, yet it is precisely the lack of preoccupation with religion that is held to characterize secular man. A fortiori, it is odd to suppose that secularity not only serves to distinguish broadly among kinds of societies—those with and without religion—but that it also determines the principal features of social and political behavior, to such an extent that one can speak of a secular political culture as a distinct and well-marked type.

In classical political thought, politics and art were alike since both were works of the practical, not the speculative, reason, within whose ample scope there was great room for things to be otherwise. Art and politics differed because politics was limited by its end, and therefore freed from the absolute indifference of pure possibility which looked to existence only as an alternative, as something which had no need of existence whatsoever, even though it was the ultimate origin of change. Art, on the other hand, was limited by the esthetic perhaps, but was not restricted by the requirement of definite being —a two-headed man, a green nose, a flying cow, any conceivable combination of sounds, shapes, or colors were thus quite possible artistically. Their reality depended on the creativity of the artist and his will to make.

The subject I am discussing here deals with a very peculiar kind of knowledge — a kind of knowledge whose means is not concepts and reasoning, but affective inclination or affinity, and which is often disregarded by philosophers interested only in the rational kind of knowing. Henri Bergson liked to quote a sentence he found in the letters of a French philosopher; the sentence was as follows: “I have suffered from this friend enough to know him.” When I know a friend to the core — not through having submitted him to a complete series of psychological tests, but because I have suffered from him and have got in myself the habit of his nature — then we may say in philosophical language that I know this man by connaturality.

Changes in voting behavior and the party system in the three federal elections since 1980 indicate that West German politics have entered a new transitional phase. The periods of CDU hegemony, 1949–1969, and two party competition, 1972–1980, have passed. Both major parties have lost support, turnout has declined, ticket-splitting has increased and New Politics issues such as the environment, disarmament and civil liberties have become salient to increasing numbers of voters. The influence of social class, religion and regional ties on voting behavior has declined. Electoral behavior has become more volatile and uncertain. Four major sources of these changes are identified: the postwar transformation of German social structure; the changing value priorities of mass publics; the introduction of new issues; and the electoral strategies of the parties as determined by their elites and leaders. The study concludes with a discussion of the future of the party system and the prospects for a major dealignment or realignment in West German politics.

Almost every period of crisis and decision in American history has produced writers on political affairs who have championed a “realistic” approach to the study of human and social problems. Convinced that successful political action must proceed from man “as he is,” such writers have been persistently and profoundly suspicious of theories which, they believe, are based either upon faulty assessments of the actual nature of the individual or upon visionary estimates of his potentialities. It is the opinion of these analysts that the nature of man is irrevocably fixed in its partially depraved and partially irrational career—a constant, as it were, among the myriad imponderables entering into the social equation. Thus it has long been a significant part of their method to attempt to discover in the experience of the past a coherent theory of limits applicable to contemporary political society. Eager to profit from the experience of other generations with the perennial problems of government and politics, they have generally displayed little tolerance toward those who would flaunt rationally grounded political experiment in the face of the practical lessons of history. Such combination of pessimistic analysis and resort to the experience of the past—Political Realism —has played a crucial role in the history of political thought in America.

French social Catholicism—by which we mean the sum of all the efforts of Catholics in France to fight against the material and moral misery that the industrial revolution and economic liberalism inflicted upon the workers — has followed two general tendencies, one aristocratic and the other democratic.

The first, developed in the legitimist world of the Restoration, gave rise to a rightist Catholic social tradition which placed all its confidence in the authority of the upper classes and in the virtue of institutions. The second, which recruited its partisans from among the lower bourgeoisie and among the intellectuals, gave rise to a leftist tradition, that of Christian democracy, and placed its trust in popular liberty.

Despite its enduring appeal, the republican vision of political life has been the subject of numerous recent criticisms. Both its relevance to an age of large-scale organizations and its desirability in an era which professes concern for individual autonomy has been questioned. However, a reconsideration of these challenges to republicanism suggests that they can be effectively met without sacrificing the core values of republicanism. Consequently, by adapting it to contemporary political realities the republican ideal can in fact serve as an apt antidote against many current political ills. Admittedly, though, any form of republicanism that is going to be viable today will assume a character at odds with either republicanism's classical or commercial modes.

If burma has needed to prove its right to be considered genuinely neutral in world affairs, it clearly did so in the first weeks of November 1956. At a time when it was engaged in crucial negotiations with Red China over Chinese incursions into its border territories, Burma chose to go on record in the United Nations and in the councils of the uncommitted Asian nations strongly condemning Russian aggression in Hungary along with the British, French and Israeli aggression in Egypt. Despite this, Burma to date has managed to hold its own in the Chinese negotiations.

This is a friendly critique of the Liberation Theology being elaborated in Latin America. The preferential option for the poor constricts its attention to economic disadvantage, and ascribes virtually all impoverishment to purposeful oppression. The poor are, simply in virtue of their deprivation, said to be so morally exalted that the gospel has for them no call to conversion. Theirs is a salvation without further ado. Yet their salvation turns out to be predominantly, if not exclusively, economic and political. A predilection for the Exodus displaces the death and resurrection ofJesus as the dominant paradigm for liberation. It is maladapted to a Christian vision of liberation, which must aim at communion with the enemy, not mere triumph. By claiming justice as its goal and fulfillment, liberation theology seems to suffer from a loss of Christian nerve. Looking to the socialist state as the sure guarantor of justice, it seems politically naive, and barren of the Christian hope that both exploiter and victim must be transformed into more than just persons (because prepared to return good for evil) well before the society around them has become a fit home even for justice.

Ancient traditions have stressed the intervention of the gods and contemporary moralists picture God as being on their side in international conflicts. Pharisaism, Manichaeism and the morality of progress are other distortions of political ethics. The first step in a more profound understanding of the ethical dimension of diplomacy is a clear-eyed view of the good and evil in human nature informed by philosophy and history. However, differences exist among political realists and international lawyers who have examined human nature in these terms. Some emphasize the relevance of ethics for international politics while others question it. Democratic foreign policy poses special problems for those who discuss international morality. Such issues are resolved at least partly within the tradition of practical morality which the article considers in conclusion.

Two months before the Bolshevik Revolution, Felix Cole, a 29-year-old clerk at the American Embassy at Petrograd was promoted to vice-consul at frigid and remote Archangel. As the Allies, in the spring of 1918, began to advocate military intervention in North Russia, Cole came to a far different conclusion. In his view economic aid to the North, especially in foodstuffs, would do far more to maintain Allied influence than the use of force. However, Ambassador David R. Francis and his foreign service colleagues abruptly dismissed Cole's warnings against military intervention as being unworthy of serious consideration. Tragically for the 222 Americans who died in the resulting Anglo-American military expedition to Archangel, Cole was ignored when he predicted: “Intervention will begin on a small scale but with each step forward will grow in its demands for ships, men, money and materials.”

This article examines Hegel's philosophy of history with the intention of once again rendering it strange. Hegel's “historicism” has been accepted for so long that the actual terms of his history are rarely examined afresh. But his account of the past, it is argued here, is best understood through the vocabulary of art and beauty that he develops in the Aesthetics. Historical forms cannot be wholly grasped through the vocabulary of dialectical reason, but ought to be seen as “shapes” in a strong sense. Two principle conclusions follow from this reassessment: The first is that the Philosophy of History is best understood neither as an optimistic account of rational progress, nor as a tale of the “end of history” in liberal democracy, but as an attempt to “seduce us to life”—that is, an attempt to reconcile us to the world through the beauty of history. The second conclusion is that this attempt must fail. It fails because, in his effort to discern beauty in the past, Hegel imposes a completeness upon time that excludes the possibility of a future. Whether intentionally or not, Hegel's pessimism about art is transmitted to his philosophy of history. The Temple of Memory that Hegel builds to shelter our souls ends up imprisoning them instead.

Are the Germans really behind the Nazi Government? Despite— or because of?—the steadily rising flood of books dealing with the Third Reich this question is answered in most different ways. There is no agreement concerning the relations between the German people and the National Socialist regime. But one's attitude towards the conduct of the war and the post-war problems is, to a large extent, determined by the opinion that one holds about these relations. Therefore, some remarks about the different answers which are given to the question: What are the sources of Hitler's power in Germany? may be of general interest.

This article offers an interpretation of British philosopher William Godwin's theory of property ownership, as outlined in his Enquiry Concerning Political Justice. Godwin's work can be read as presenting an incoherent account of property rights, which, on the one hand, justifies its existence on seemingly utilitarian grounds while, on the other, impugns its legitimacy on egalitarian grounds. But the contradiction apparent in Godwin's position is actually illusory and can in fact be plausibly interpreted as comprising a coherent two-level understanding of political morality, wherein the right to own private property is best comprehended as a “right to do wrong.”

A Dolf Hitler passed the long, summer days of his 1924 incarceration in the Landsberg fortress reliving his past. Each day he retired to a large and sunny room to dictate the story of his “Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity, and Cowardice” to his admirers, Emil Maurice and Rudolf Hess. As he paced the room, Hitler subjected his memories of childhood in upper-Austria, youth in Vienna and Munich, young manhood at the Western front, and political awakening in postwar Munich to the scrutiny of his accumulated political wisdom at thirty-five. He vindicated his ideas by an examination of his life revealing how personal experiences led him to knowledge and truth in page after page of poor prose.

John P. McCormick has become the leading proponent of a new democratic—or, now, “populist”—reading of Machiavelli. The authors of all three of the other books reviewed here cite McCormick as a source and inspiration; and he has written positive blurbs for their books. In Machiavellian Democracy (Cambridge University Press, 2011) McCormick argued that Machiavelli's praise of Roman “offices or assemblies that exclude the wealthiest citizens from eligibility; magistrate appointment procedures that combine lottery and election; and political trials in which the entire citizenry acts as ultimate judge over prosecutions and appeals” constitutes “a robust, extra-electoral model of elite accountability and popular empowerment” very different from, and much superior to, the aristocratic “republicanism” attributed to Machiavelli by the “Cambridge school.” In Reading Machiavelli: Scandalous Books, Suspect Engagements, and the Virtue of Populist Politics, McCormick extends his previous analysis by offering “original readings of crucial themes within … The Prince, the Discourses, and the Florentine Histories” (1–2). He also expands his critique of competing interpretations of Machiavelli and Rome by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Leo Strauss, John Pocock, and Quentin Skinner.