Émile Perreau-Saussine

From Infogalactic: the planetary knowledge core
Jump to: navigation, search

Émile Perreau-Saussine (22 September 1972 – 23 February 2010) was a French historian of political thought and academic. His work focused on political philosophy and the relationship between politics and religion in the contemporary era.

Biography

A Sciences Po graduate (public service section, 1994), Perreau-Saussine turned his attention to political philosophy at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences from which he graduated (doctorate in political studies, Raymond Aron Center) and at the University of Chicago (Bradley Fellow at the Committee of Social Thoughts).

Perreau-Saussine taught at the University of Cambridge from 2000, as Professor of the History of Political Philosophy in the University's Department of Politics and International Studies (Newton Trust; Fitzwilliam College; Pembroke College); he was also a lecturer at Sciences Po and a visiting professor at the Paris 2 Panthéon-Assas University (Centre Michel Villey).

In February 2010, Émile Perreau-Saussine was rushed to Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, with chest pains. The junior physician on staff misdiagnosed his condition and thus failed to prevent his death hours later of a massive heart attack at the age of 37.[1]

Writings

Émile Perreau-Saussine's publications, both in French and in English, began with a remarkable biography of Alasdair MacIntyre. The result of his doctoral thesis, it was awarded the Philippe Habert Prize in 2006. This was followed by numerous articles and conferences, notably on politics and the Catholic Church.

Perreau-Saussine was also the author of important contributions on religious and liberal nationalism in Pakistan, anti-Semitism in France or various authors such as Saint Augustine, Tocqueville, Carl Schmitt or Quentin Skinner. Many of them have been translated into English, Chinese, Hungarian, Polish, Hebrew, etc.

In the liberal movement, with masters such as Pierre Manent, Perreau-Saussine participated in the editorial board of the journal Commentaire.

In the United States, where he enjoyed a solid reputation, his book Catholicism and Democracy: An Essay in the History of Political Thought was published by Princeton University Press. This book (written in French, La pensée politique catholique à l'ère démocratique: une histoire) analyzes with finesse the consequences of the deconfessionalization of the state since the French Revolution. It aims to show how the great quarrels of French religious history have been overcome, notably the secularization of temporal power, the impasse of reactionary Gallicanism, or secularism; and to deduce the place that the Catholic Church can secure for itself in liberal democracy, by relying on the very principles of the latter, and by providing the necessary wisdom that democratic life does not produce of itself.

Perreau-Saussine outlined the beginnings of this analysis in April 2009 in a conference at the Foundation for Political Innovation on the theme of the Catholic Church in the contemporary trials of liberal democracy. He deduced how Catholicism, now converted to democracy and religious freedom, brought an indispensable moderation and refuted any amalgam with the different forms of fanaticism.

Works

<templatestyles src="Div col/styles.css"/>

Major publications

  • Alasdair MacIntyre: Une Biographie Intellectuelle: Introduction aux Critiques Contemporaines du Libéralisme (2005)[2]
  • Catholicisme et Démocratie: Une Histoire de la Pensée Politique (2011)[3]

Collaborations

  • "La Crise du Parti Républicain," Commentaire, No. 87 (automne 1999), pp. 739–44.
  • "Carl Schmitt contre la Guerre Juste," Commentaire, No. 96 (hiver 2001-2002), pp. 972–73.
  • "Raymond Aron et Carl Schmitt, Lecteurs de Clausewitz," Commentaire, No. 103 (automne 2003), pp. 617–22.
  • "Une Spiritualité Démocratique?," Revue française de science politique, Vol. LV, No 2 (avril 2005), pp. 299–315.
  • "Les Libéraux Face aux Révolutions: 1688, 1789, 1917, 1933," Commentaire, No. 109 (printemps 2005), pp. 181–193.
  • "Les Flottements Politiques du Catholicisme Moderne. Du Néo-thomisme d’Action Française au Christianisme Marxiste," Communio (July 2005), Vol. XXX, No. 4, pp. 101–18.
  • "Are the French Anti-Semitic?," Azure (automne 2005), pp. 162–68.
  • "Why Draw a Politics from Scripture? Bossuet and the Divine Right of Kings." In: G. Schochet, F. Oz-Salzberger, M. Jones, eds., Political Hebraism: Judaic Sources in Early Modern Political Though (Shalem Press, 2008), pp. 90–104.
  • Bryan Turner, ed., The Cambridge Dictionary of Sociology (Cambridge University Press, 2006); three entries: "Imperialism" (pp. 280–81), "Justice" (pp. 310–11), and "MacIntyre" (p. 346).
  • "Le Plaidoyer de MacIntyre pour une Justice Naturelle," Revue Française de Théorie, de Philosophie et de Culture Juridique, Vol. XLIV (2007), pp. 219–27.
  • "Quentin Skinner in Context," Review of Politics, Vol. LVIII, No. 1 (2007), p. 106–22.
  • "Ce qui Reste du Socialisme," Le Débat, No. 142 (novembre 2006), pp. 56–74.[4]
  • "Athéisme et Politique," Critique, No. 728/729 (février 2008), pp. 130–44.
  • "Gandhi, Théoricien de la Servitude Volontaire. Une Philosophie de la Décolonisation." In: Actes des Journées Internationales de Saint-Cyr Coëtquidan. Conférence d'Éthique Militaire (Presses de l'Armée de Terre, 2006), pp. 131–49.
  • "Marcel Gauchet contre Tocqueville," Commentaire, No. 121 (printemps 2008), pp. 378–83.
  • "Liquider Mai 68? In: Les Droites en France (1789-2008) (CNRS Éditions, 2008), pp. 61–68.
  • "French Catholic Political Thought from the Deconfessionnalisation of the State to the Recognition of Religious Freedom." In: Gareth Stedman Jones and Ira Katznelson, eds., Secularisation Revisited: Religion and Politics (1500-2006) (Cambridge University Press, 2010).
  • "Why Maistre Became Ultramontane." In: Richard Lebrun & Carolina Armenteros, eds., Joseph de Maistre and the Enlightenment (Voltaire Foundation, 2010).
  • "Heaven as a Political Theme in Augustine's City of God." In: Markus Bockmuehl and Guy Stroumsa, eds. Paradise in late antiquity (Cambridge University Press, 2010).
  • "Pakistan à la Recherche d'un Nationalisme Religieux et Libéral," Commentaire, No. 126 (été 2009), p. 353–62.
  • "État et Religion en Angleterre." In: Philippe Portier and Brigitte Feuillet, eds., Droit, Éthique et Religion (Bruylant, 2010)
  • " Où va la Politique de l’Église Catholique?," Fondation pour l'Innovation Politique (octobre 2009).

Notes

  1. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. Translated into English. See Alasdair MacIntyre: An Intellectual Biography (University of Notre Dame Press, 2022).
  3. Translated into English. See Catholicism and Democracy: An Essay in the History of Political Thought (Princeton University Press, 2012).
  4. Translated into English. See "What Remains of Socialism? In: Patrick Riordan, ed., Values in Public Life: Aspects of Common Goods (LIT Verlag, 2007), pp. 11–34.

External links