Progressive Geographies

Chapter Nine is now done. This is the last chapter of the book, which means I’ve now worked through all the chapters in the revision I’ve done while in Seattle. I leave tomorrow. I’ve posted quite a bit about this chapter before (i.e. here, here and here), since I wrote it between May and October this year, when I was already doing this blog.

Basically the chapter is on the seventeenth century. It begins with a section I call ‘The Consolidation of the Reformation’ which looks at Hooker, Althusius, Zasius, Stephani, Knichen, Bacon, and ‘Walter Ralegh’ (actually the focus is a text probably not by him). There is then a section on the relation between the scientific revolution and politics – Descartes, a brief backtrack to Copernicus, Galileo, and Cusa, a little on Hobbes, some on Spinoza, Boulainviller, Newton and Leibniz. There is then a fuller discussion of Hobbes, Filmer and Locke, plus a bit on Neville and Harrington. I’ve ended up dropping the discussion of George Lawson down to a single footnote, and removed most of the discussion of Hobbes’s reading of Cardinal Bellarmine. Throughout I try to historically and geographically situate these writers and the debates.  The final section is principally on struggles within the Empire, looking at Reinking, von Chemnitz, the Westphalia treaties, Pufendorf, and Leibniz again.

Most of the relatively minor work on this revision was cutting some of the lengthy quotes from these writers down to try to tighten up the argument. The notes were in good shape: I was keen not to leave things in this chapter undone before I left London.