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*Early Modernity*

A historical period spanning the XV-XVII centuries. It is characterized by significant ruptures in philosophical, legal-political, religious, and sociological spheres.

*Philosophical Rupture in Early Modernity*

Introduced by voluntarism (XIII-XIV centuries). Marked the beginning of subjectivism through rationalism.

*Legal-Political Rupture in Early Modernity*

Introduced by the emergence of the State, contractualism, and modern political science (XV-XVII centuries). Inaugurated political artificialism.

*Religious Rupture in Early Modernity*

Introduced by the Protestant Reformation (1517). Led to the dissolution of the medieval European religious unity. Also caused the breakdown of the universality of the moral authority of the Roman Church.

*Sociological Rupture in Early Modernity*

Introduced by the Peace of Westphalia (1648). Resulted in the dissolution of medieval European political unity. Consolidated the State as a particularist political form and reconfigured the European political map. Marked the breakdown of the political universality of the res publica christiana and the beginning of the ius publicum europaeum.

*Historical-Political Origin of the State*

Identified as a new phenomenon of power in the Italian signories. Characterized by the monopoly of private armies by princes who imposed their will within a territory. Niccolo Machiavelli called this lo stato.

*Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527)*

A Florentine civil servant. Coined the term lo stato. Authored The Prince (published 1513, posthumously 1532). His work describes the monarch's ability to concentrate and conserve power, settle unpredictability through rational politics, and control public life via administrative and fiscal systems.

*Machiavellian Contribution: Modern Political Science*

Represents the passage of "the political" (organization around justice and common good) in favor of "politics" (the technical and professionalized exercise of power).

*Machiavellian Contribution: Cratology (Science of Power / Reason of State)*

Also known as ratio status. Involves the loss of the need for extrinsic references to justify power. The State gains the ability to legitimize itself by its own factual action using force. It becomes self-referent. Represents the origin of political immanentism and the blurring of moral authority in favor of modern sovereignty.

*Contractualism*

A philosophical doctrine popular between the XVI-XVIII centuries. Has a Protestant theological matrix. Justifies the State's appearance as a political form that rationalizes chaos.

*Key Concept in Contractualism: Negation of Man's Political and Social Nature*

Contractualism denies that man is naturally political or social, eliminating the idea of spontaneous relating. Sociability and politicity are explained as an aggregate or condition added via imputation through a contract or pact under voluntarist terms.

*Key Concept in Contractualism: State of Nature*

A foundational account of the situation existing prior to the State. Describes the individual in a proto-social and proto-political scenario. It is depicted as a-historical and abstract. Conditions in the state of nature universally coincide in a situation of disorder and political urgency.

*Key Postulates Converging in Contractualism*

Convergence of the nominalist idea (dissolution in an abstract reality) and the escotist idea (need for a formalized reality).

*Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)*

Biographically conditioned by conflict against Spain and the English civil war; he called himself "the twin of fear". Of Lutheran formation, therefore nominalist, and strongly marked by the fear of sin.

*Hobbesian Theological-Political Elements: Hamartiocentrism & Traducianism*

Hamartiocentrism is the tendency towards the doctrine of sin. Traducianism is the belief in the universal inheritance of original sin.

*Hobbesian Theological-Political Elements: Predestination & Lapsarianism*

Belief in predestination, specifically infralapsarianism (logical order of God's decree on man's fate as a consequence of the "lapse" or fall). Creates an image of a politicized and discretionary God.

*Hobbesian Theological-Political Elements: Denial of Freedom & Anathematization of Nature*

Denial of Human Freedom is the rejection of free will and the capacity to choose the good or access divine grace through good works. Anathematization of Nature is the demonization of the physical world as a place of exile and sin, where only corruption and disorder are possible.

*Hobbesian Anthropology*

Fallibilist or pessimistic, describing human nature as irreversibly traversed by moral prevarication. Assumes an inexorable tendency to do evil.

*Leviathan*

Authored by Thomas Hobbes. Published in 1651. Constitutes the nucleus of Hobbesian doctrine and the consolidation of state political thought. Depicts the State as a geometrical, moralizing, and cratological form mentis. Ordered under the modern principle of sovereignty (attributed to John Bodin). Describes conditions before and after the State's formation.

*Hobbes's State of Nature (in Leviathan)*

A perpetual situation of war of all against all or fratricidal war, which condemns man to annihilation. Often described by the phrase "homo hominis lupus est" (man is a wolf to man). The individual, unable to do good due to corrupt freedom and vitiated will, displays their worst passions.

*Hobbes's Contract (in Leviathan)*

A hypostatic union between the social pact and the political pact. Results in the absorption of the social order by the political one. Conceived as a union of wills that generates a supra-will. Founds the political as an artificial and rationally designed order. Establishes clauses demanding the surrender of human freedom in exchange for political security.

*Hobbes's Leviathan State*

The political machine described under the iconic reference of the Old Testament sea monster, Leviathan. Represents thalassocracy and state Protestant modernity. Antithetical to Behemoth, which symbolizes old medieval Catholic Europe. On the cover, the giant body composed of individuals represents the body politic. The right hand holds the sword (potestas), the left hand holds the staff (autoritas), and the crown symbolizes sovereignty.

*Hobbes's Juridical-Political Architecture of the State*

Conceived in Scotus terms as a formal representation of the natural order instituted by God. Uses rationalist presuppositions to interpret scholastic principles of natural law and apply them to the logic of the State.

*Primary Aim of the Hobbesian State*

Security. The State aims to free evil from its tendency to sin. Following Lutheran ideas, the state machinery becomes a guarantee of salvation. Law becomes a moral and moralizing instrument capable of correcting consciences through violence. Hobbes was more concerned with security than the moral question.

*Hobbes's Religious Question & the State*

Justifies state foundation and monarchical power via theological-political elements and the doctrine of the divine right of kings. Repeats "Jesus is the Christ" to neutralize theological debates and displace the Catholic Church's influence. Employs the nominalist concept of the Deus Absconditus ("hidden God"), suggesting a testimonial God who does not providentially intercede in state affairs. The State takes over the soteriological mission (redeeming man from sin) as a rational replica of the divine order.

*Three Great Ends of the State (Deducible from Hobbes)*

1. To order the chaos. 2. To concentrate and conserve the power. 3. To moralize society.

*Conclusions on Early Statehood*

Early state steps combine theological justifications with increasing rationalist assumptions. The secularizing process initiated by the Protestant Reformation displaced the religious ethos from the public space. This ethos was supplanted by a political morality produced by the state itself.

*Late Modernity (18th-19th centuries)*

A period where modern rationalism prevailed, influenced by figures like Kant, leading to the Enlightenment. It ideologically took hold after the French Revolution.

*Rousseau's Contractualism*

Offered philosophical bases for the French Revolution. It posited that man is born without original sin (angelism/bonhomism), viewing the state of nature as a pristine state where man is a "good savage". Despite this, the state of nature had social disintegration requiring a contract that established the State based on freedom and equality. This made the political community/State a moral entity, defining morality as a contractual result. Evils were blamed on civil society relations, and State law and violence were seen as instruments for moralization.

*The French Revolution (1789)*

A utopian attempt, influenced by the Enlightenment, to create a new state based on reason and progress by liquidating previous orders and creating a "new man". Its motto was "Liberty, equality and fraternity". It transferred sovereignty from the monarch to the community/nation and consecrated the Nation-State. Consequences included the violent period of The Terror, using violence for purgative purposes, and representing the first proto-totalitarian regime and exhibition of political religiosity.

*Nationalist Spirit*

Emerged in the 19th century, combining elements from the Nation-State, liberalism, idealism, and romanticism. It involved the mythologization of the past and glorification of the future to legitimize the nation's triumph. It presented the nation as the main protagonist, justifying its prevalence, and could manifest as either emancipatory (seeking independence) or expansionist (seeking dominance).

*Industrial Society*

Developed during the Industrial Revolution (1820-1840), marked by mercantilism, liberalism, capitalism, and utilitarianism. Key features included the rise of industry with mass production, urbanization and its associated problems like overpopulation and impoverishment, and a clear division of social classes between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. This system faced criticism from movements like socialism and anarchism.

*Marxism*

Particularly from Karl Marx, was a critique of capitalism. It saw society divided into an oppressive superstructure (capitalists, private property, state, religion) and an oppressed infrastructure (proletariat). It highlighted surplus value (worker profit taken by capital) and private property as causes of inequality. It viewed religion as "the opium of the people". History was seen as driven by violent class struggle towards a final state of absolute equality, the dictatorship of the proletariat, aiming for an intra-historical salvation.

*Nihilism*

A philosophy underlying the atheistic turn, championed by Nietzsche. It posits that because nothingness is the origin, nothing truly exists; reality is interpretation ("no facts, only interpretations"). It is an irreligion that rejects traditional morality and social norms. It involves the proclamation of the "death of God" and the rise of the "superman," a new archetype free from traditional constraints, capable of imposing his will. Associated ideas include vitalism (embracing passion/hedonism), the will to power (desire and capacity for satisfaction), and the eternal return (existence is repetitive, encouraging domination/enjoyment).

*Totalitarianism*

A political model distinct from dictatorship and authoritarianism. It suppresses rights, limits freedom, opposes democracy, and concentrates power in a single party/leader. Its defining feature is the domination of thought and the assault on human conscience, using propaganda and indoctrination. It seeks to create a new world free from evil, identifying a sacralized ideal good.

*Dictatorship*

A temporary concentration of power during a crisis to restore order.

*Authoritarianism*

Involves a strong leader and power concentration but is generally less repressive and doesn't aim for total thought control like totalitarianism.

*National Socialism (Nazism)*

A German totalitarian regime (1933-1945) combining nationalism, racial ideology, and expansionism.

*Italian Fascism*

An Italian totalitarian regime (1922-1945) focused on rebuilding a "Third Rome" and embodying Nietzschean ideas.

*Soviet Communism*

A Russian totalitarian regime (1917-1991) based on Marxism, aiming for internationalism, and characterized by hero worship and identifying enemies.

*Post-postmodernity*

The period after WW2 characterized by the rise of social democracy in the West. Intellectual shifts led to more progressive and secular views, emphasizing infinite progress.

*Transhumanism*

A progressive ideology, influenced by nihilism, that seeks to overcome human nature using science and technology to create an improved state. It denies the fixed nature of the self and views life as a commodity. Its goals include achieving super longevity/immortality, infinite well-being, and superintelligence. Related concepts include gender ideology (sex as individual perception), certain forms of Environmentalism, Malthusianism (population control via eugenics), Multiculturalism (creating a homogeneous space, viewed by some critics as leading to a "world state" and cultural disintegration), and The "great replacement" (a theory by some critics of multiculturalism alleging a deliberate demographic shift, which the source notes lacks scientific basis but aligns with demographic trends).

*The "great replacement"*

Extension of multiculturalism critique. Hidden agenda among globalists to make races disappear via miscegenation, interracial marriages, generational replacement by immigrants. Lacks scientific basis, but immigration coupled with aging Western societies and declining birth rates seems to attest to a gradual process of racial replacement.