The Portrait Of A Straussian: Discourse On Harvey Mansfield's Political Thoughts

Harvey C. Mansfield, Jr.,(1932—)is a Harvard Professor in America, who is renowned as a political philosopher and conservative thinker nowadays. As one of the main Straussians, Mansfield has won a high academic status and reputation in America's intellectual field or even that of the western world. Mansfield has a vast field of study and authors numerous books, which include the case study on Aristotle, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Burke, Tocqueville, and Jefferson, etc., and link the history of western political thoughts from the ancient to modern times; and refer to the topics of liberalism, conservatism, American constitution, political parties, executive power, manliness and other great themes concerning political philosophy. Besides, Mansfield"goes into the secularity"actively and comments on the political affairs, numerous book reviews and political articles are thus issued by him on feminism, affirmative action, political correctness in some famous newspapers and Journals. To clarify the thoughts of such a multi-dimensional thinker clearly is the objective of the paper.The paper will explore Mansfield's intellectual sources, which includes situating him as one important branch among Straussians and paying due attention to his methodological disagreements with the Cambridge School and other Straussians, at the same time, this exploration will be placed in the long-term historical context such as the background of traditional western political philosophy and the unique tradition of American political thoughts ect.The paper will then focus on Mansfield's study objects such as political parties, executive power and American constitution etc, which reflect the deep insights and thoroughness of his political thoughts, as well as the basic structures and frames of Mansfield's conservative thoughts. The third part of the paper will concentrate on the core ideas of Mansfield's political thoughts, which embody mainly Mansfield's unique conservative views of liberty and the concerning ideas of equality and elitism, and the interpretation of Machiavelli is the key point of Mansfield's political thoughts, who is a pivotal person"inheriting the past"(classical political philosophy) and"ushering in the future"(modern political philosophy and unique American political theory).The last part of the paper will examine the echoes of Mansfield's thoughts in reality, and how Mansfield combines his theoretical structures and realistic problems closely,"To preach what one says"is a remarkable characteristic of Mansfield's political thoughts.As an intelligent and controversial thinker, Mansfield makes innovations by following Strauss, i.e. his teacher's doctrines. As an extraordinary entity, the depth and precision of his thoughts are outstanding.