"Strauss . . . makes a significant contribution towards an understanding of the intellectual crisis in which we find ourselves . . . [and] brings to his task an admirable scholarship and a brilliant, incisive mind."--John H. Hallowell, American Political Science Review

Leo Strauss (1899-1973) was the Robert Maynard Hutchins Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus in Political Science at the University of Chicago.

Amid the recent Leo Strauss craze, perpetuated by a largely sensationalist media blindly driven towards the holy grail of conspiracy theory, I decided to pick up Natural Right and History. While, obviously, one cannot ascertain his entire political message by merely one book, reading Natural Right and History helps obviate the connection.

Natural Right is a "biography" of the idea of natural right. Strauss traces the idea of natural right, from antiquity to modernity to postmodernity. In classic "Straussian" form, to understand the political implications of this book, you have to read painstakingly between the lines.

Strauss starts the book with a rather standard critique of historicism (historical relativism) and conventionalism. His argument against value relativism is very straight forward; hardly any social scientist today makes the claims that Strauss refutes. The new relativism is a more sophisitcated one, couched behind postmodernist word-games.

However, social science is largely built upon the theories of Max Weber. Thus, Strauss uses a reduction proof. If he can reduce social science to Weber, and if he can reduce Weber to historicism, then he can effectively show that the methodologies social science are fallacious, since he shows that historicism is false. Consequently he can show that a historicist understanding of natural right is also bunk. To be sure, this is an extremely risky strategy since the argument relies on a lengthy chain of reasoning.

Having attacked postmodern notions of natural right, Strauss restarts at antiquity and works his way up to modernity. Strauss shows the evolution of the idea of natural right, from "Socrates" to Plato to Aristotle to Hobbes to Locke to Rousseau to Burke.

So which conception of natural rights does Strauss believe in - the classical or the modern (enlightenment)? In short, he subscribes to the classical. Why? Succinctly, Strauss contends that natural right became doomed the second that Hobbes injected his hedonism into natural right.

A different way approach is to look at Strauss's juxtaposition of (classical vs modern) as (republicanism vs. liberalism). By liberalism, I mean classical liberal, i.e. enlightenment liberal. Classical liberalism is the view that individuals are prior to society. By republicanism, I do not mean anything related to the republican party. Republicanism means that individuals are willing to sacrifice their private interests to the public good, i.e. civic virtue. Republicanism means, in extremely superficial terms, that civil society is prior to the individual.

With that said, I totally disagree with Strauss's analysis, for more reasons I can delve into here. I think that the rights of classical liberalism, as Locke conceived it, is largely correct. However, Strauss plays a vital role in the ongoing conversation of rights in political science and philosophy. For producing a very challenging, thought-provoking analysis, this book gets 5 stars. Beware: it's not a light read!


A digest of western thought that doesn't oversimplify   May 19, 2002
Christopher David Kirk (Memphis, TN United States)
37 out of 40 found this review helpful

This book contains a critique of modern relativism coupled with a historical investigation of the development of the idea of natural right. As moderns we consider our philosophical predecessors as caused by history rather than causing it. Strauss demolishes this view by giving a history of Western thought that explains the historical origin of the idea of natural right far better than those who treat all thought as historically limited.

Although Strauss writes "compactly" (he doesn't waste words in getting to the point), his book is quite revealing about the rationales for certain ancient, medieval, and modern political ideas. For those of us who usually find these ideas outlandish or even perverse, this book is extremely rewarding (contrary to another reviewer's vague suggestion). If you have trouble comprehending everything, consume the book in smaller bites. Those interested in the American founding, for instance, should probably concentrate on the chapter entitled "Modern Natural Right"; others may want to explore what political thought looked like before the rise of "science"; for that look at the chapter entitled "The Origin of the Idea of Natural Right". Etc. Etc.

This book is essential for anybody interested in getting a picture of the whole of Western (and even non-Western) thought, but who finds himself disenchanted with glib postmodernist glosses of what is a very complicated subject.


Essential   August 31, 2002
Z. Liu (Chicago)
42 out of 47 found this review helpful

I first encountered this book in high school, spurred by my american history and american government teachers. It is therefore somewhat elitist to state that this will go over anyone's head. The ideas and the prose may be complex, but it just requires some patience. If it's worth it to you, you'll be able to read it.

Strauss gave these lectures to counter what then was called historicism, the position that, because conceptions of such things as freedom and right have been so varied throughout time, that because nobody has been able to agree on what right is, that right is relative to the time. The upshod of the arguement is then, since nothing can count as right definitively, there is no right. Strauss argues that historicism, by being another appearance in history, is subject to the same criticism (therefore interally inconsistent) and that even if nobody has been able to agree on "right" doesn't mean that there isn't any such thing, but because debate has been so heated on the subject, it is only all the more evident that there is such a thing such as right.

I may be a slightly biased source, but i've read my share of Levi-Strauss and Foucault. Sure, Strauss confines himself to political philosophy, but the larger issues are there. Postmodern thought is showing strains of its own now, and Strauss pointed them out before they realized they were postmodern. Essential reading for both camps.


The History of Ideas   May 13, 2000
15 out of 18 found this review helpful

"Nature was discovered when man embarked on the fundamental distinctions between hearsay and seeing with one's own eyes, on the one hand, and between things made by man and things not made by man, on the other."

Strauss provides a powerful and scholarly work in his tracing the idea of natural right. Strauss explains the origins of natural right, classical natural right, modern natural right and more. He includes arguments against Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Burke, and Weber. The depth of thought may be too much for the common reader, I found it difficult to fully grasp all of Strauss's ideas myself, but it is well worth reading for anyone interested in natural law or the history of ideas.


What Could Be More Important?   December 15, 2002
T. Bouthillet
57 out of 75 found this review helpful

There is a hidden danger when the social sciences reduce America's claims to truth to mere products of history and culture. What happens when generations of American students are taught that America's founding happened strictly for economic reasons? Or that far from being heroes, the framers are guilty of genocide? Or that we only believe what we believe because we are 21st century, middle class, American consumers of mass culture? Strauss shows us that once we realize that our ideals have no basis in ultimate truth or reality, we no longer believe in them. In fact, our way of life is no more defendable than the life of the cannibal, for he too is a product of his history and culture. The modern assault on the natural right tradition has consequences beyond the ability of the modern student to grasp. It is beyond his grasp because he no longer bothers to tangle with the most important questions. They no longer have meaning. There simply isn't anything worth believing in, let alone dying for.

Strauss dares to question the superiority of modern thought. Could it be that the classics had it right? And that the modern confrontation with nihilism is a radical misadventure? How do we know that all truth is relative? Can this be demonstrated or is this widely held belief based on surprisingly weak assumptions about man's inability to know what is good? Strauss shows that the rejection of natural right in the name of history is a contradiction. He also demonstrates that the distinction between facts and values in the social sciences is problematic at best. He then goes on to reacquaint the reader with the natural right tradition, as he traces it from its earliest beginnings to its modern form, including it's current crisis.

I don't claim to understand everything in this book. But because it's so far above me it's the gift that keeps on giving. In some ways I see Strauss as not only a political philosopher, but also as a prophet. A rare mind who saw darkness on the horizon, and did his part to stand against a rising tide. He engaged the greatest minds in human history, and wrote down his arguments for everyone to see. If you read this book slowly and carefully, you are guaranteed to learn something valuable. Only the most rank ideologue would fail to see Strauss' love of philosophy. Some may politicize his thought, but Strauss himself rose far above partisanship. To view him as the architect of the war in Iraq, for example, is to do violence to who Strauss was. Why not read him for yourself, and make up your own mind?