A Roundtable on James Hankins' "Virtue Politics" (2019)

Session Submission Type: Virtual Author meet critics

Session Description

Subtitle: Political Legitimacy, Moral Character, and Civic Life.

In the mid-14th century Italy was experiencing a crisis of unprecedented magnitude. The competing swords of the two universal authorities–the spiritual and the temporal–were unable to command the respect and obedience of those they were supposed to rule. The Catholic Church was corrupt and internally divided; the papacy, no longer based in Rome but forcedly transferred to Avignon, had become a puppet in the hands of French monarchs; and the Emperor lacked the military and political power to prevail over his multiple enemies–a chaotic multiplicity of local factions, lawless tyrants, and rebellious cities (not to mention the Ottoman Turks at the door of Constantinople). Moreover, the far-reaching implications of the Black Death–a pandemic that had wiped out one third of Europe’s population, plagued its nascent financial system, and eventually made the rich richer–further contributed to the apocalyptic perception of a world on the verge of collapse. (Sounds familiar?)
Amidst such a hopeless turmoil, a new generation of scholars envisioned a brave and long-term program of intellectual, moral, and political renewal. The Italian “civic humanists” that lived and wrote in the century and a half (the “long Quattrocento”) spanning from Petrarch–the spiritual leader and forerunner of the Renaissance–to Machiavelli believed in the regenerative potential of education as the “doorway” to good character and, in turn, to an enlightened exercise of political power. On their account, intellectual distinction and moral excellence were the prerequisites for legitimate political authority; any ruler who lacked both was doomed to be a tyrant. Resonating through their writings and letters was the firm belief that virtue–i.e., love of justice and the common good, respect of the laws, self-restraint, and the capacity to look past the allure of partisan interests–was the staple of true political legitimacy in a world of waning or crumbled legitimacies. Disgusted by the poor ethics of those in positions of power, they became increasingly critical of current university curricula. Medieval Scholasticism had turned into a preprofessional training in law, medicine, and the s.c. “ars nummaria” (the art of money-making), forging future elites that would venally obsess over questions of status and wealth and grow completely oblivious of the qualities that good leadership ultimately requires. To this end, Italian humanists initiated an educational revolution that was part of a broader moral and political one, revolving around the core idea that soulcraft and statecraft represented two sides of the same ambitious project. In lieu of the unimaginative memorization of legal technicalities, degrading the study of the law to a “loquax ignorantia” (talkative ignorance), the Italian literati–almost all law school dropouts–rethought from scratch the Medieval “artes liberals” and forged a new educational paradigm: the “studia humanitatis”. A 14th- and 15th-century ancestor of our humanities, this alternative curriculum sought to nurture the minds and souls of students and thus craft a well-educated and virtuous leadership that could guide Italy, Europe, and possibly the Western world out of the darkness.
Interestingly, the reformers of Renaissance humanism anticipated Thomas Jefferson’s famous distinction between a “natural aristocracy” (based on virtue and ability) and an “artificial” one (revolving around ancestry and wealth): those who ruled by hereditary right had to prove that they deserved political authority–a place of distinction that, unlike property, cannot be handed down to one’s heirs. At the same time, the program advocated by the Italian humanists was, at once, meritocratic and profoundly egalitarian. While championing virtuous individuals’ right to rule, they made it clear that the virtuous politician was educated, not born, precisely because virtue could be learnt. Anyone, if properly trained, could cultivate it, as much as those born into the ruling elite and thus blindly privileged by the lottery of life could eventually fail the test of virtue, were they reluctant to pursue intellectual–and thus moral–excellence.
This story–one of crisis and renewal–lies at the core of the latest book by Harvard historian James Hankins, Virtue Politics. Soulcraft and Statecraft in Renaissance Italy (Harvard UP, 2019). Drawing on a life-long study of Renaissance political thought and intellectual history and a quarter-century first-hand archival work, the volume successfully combines impressive historical erudition (both in breadth and depth) with a distinctively philosophical reading of the writings, ideas, and lessons from one of the richest chapters in the history of Western political thought. This panel brings together leading historians and theorists to discuss some of the major contributions of the book and its contemporary relevance. Beside the author, panelists include Stephen Macedo, Jane Mansbridge, Annabel Brett, Michelle Clarke, Vickie Sullivan, Ryan Ballot.

Sub Unit

• Division 1: Political Thought and Philosophy

Chairs

• David Ragazzoni Columbia University

• JAMES WARREN HANKINS Harvard University

Presenters

• Stephen Macedo Princeton University

• Jane Mansbridge Harvard Kennedy School

• Annabel Brett University of Cambridge

• Michelle Tolman Clarke Dartmouth College

• Vickie B. Sullivan Tufts University

• Ryan Balot University of Toronto