The Levellers : Radical political thought in the English Revolution / Rachel Foxley.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Foxley, Rachel.

Series:

Politics, culture, and society in early modern Britain

Politics, culture and society in early modern Britain

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Levellers.

Great Britain--History--Puritan Revolution, 1642-1660.

Great Britain.

History.

Physical Description:

xi, 256 pages ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Manchester : Manchester University Press, 2013.

Summary:

The Leveller movement of the 1640s campaigned for religious tolerance and a radical remaking of politics in post-civil-war England. This book, the first full-length study of the Levellers for fifty years, offers a fresh analysis of the originality and character of Leveller thought. Challenging received ideas about the Levellers as social contract theorists and Leveller thought as a mere radicalization of parliamentarian thought, Foxley shows that the Levellers' originality lay in their subtle and unexpected combination of different strands within parliamentarianism. The book offers a systematic analysis of different aspects of the Levellers' developing political thought, considering their accounts of the origins of government, their developing views on the relationship between parliament and people, their use of the language of the law, and their understanding of the relationship between religious liberty and political life. It goes on to examine the Levellers' relationship with the New Model Army and the influence of the Levellers on the republican thought of the 1650s. The book takes full account of revisionist and post-revisionist scholarship, and contributes to historical debates on the development of radical and republican politics in the civil war period, the nature of tolerationist thought, the significance of the Leveller movement, and the extent of Leveller influence in the ranks of the New Model Army. The Levellers fills a gap in the current historiography of radicalism in the English revolution, and will be useful to undergraduates and researchers in early modern political history and the history of political thought. Book jacket.

Contents:

1 Consent and the origins of government 20

2 The appeal to the people 51

3 The laws of England and the 'free-born Englishman' 91

4 Religion, politics, and conscience 119

5 Levellers and the army: England's freedom, soldiers' rights 150

6 Levellers into republicans? 194.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780719089367

0719089360

OCLC:

827256494