Ideologists before Ideology. Linguet and the Social Paradoxes of Politics

Abstract

The paper analyzes S.N.H. Linguet's political doctrine by focusing on the systematic use of paradoxes upon which it is articulated. With his critique of the physiocratic ideology, Linguet identifies the link between science and politics as the foundation both of the ideology of society and of the critique of this ideology. The conceptual constellation constituted property, appropriation, patrimonialism and patriarchy establishes the coordinates of his political theory of social concepts. The category of social relationship does not express the coordination between indifferent subjects, but the subordination of certain individuals to the social power of the owners. From his critique of Montesquieu, of his concept of law and of Asiatic despotism, Linguet moves on to stress the need for a bureaucratic state that, thanks to its positive law, is able to govern the movements of property that he recognizes as the very center of the political system.