History and Political Science

After reading Litterae Humaniores at Wadham College, Oxford, on a Rhodes Scholarship from 1971-74, I completed a Ph.D. in ancient history at Yale University under the direction of Donald Kagan in 1977. In subsequent years, I taught at Cornell University, Franklin and Marshall College, and the University of Tulsa, where I spent 24 years before accepting a position at Hillsdale College, where I am Professor of History and Political Science and hold The Charles O. Lee and Louise K. Lee Chair in the Western Heritage. My entire scholarly career has been focused on studying the origins and evolution of self-government within the West. I am the author of Republics Ancient and Modern: Classical Republicanism and the American Revolution (1992), which was reprinted in 1994 in a three-volume paperback edition, and of Against Throne and Altar: Machiavelli and Political Theory under the English Republic (2008). With David W. Carrithers and Michael A. Mosher, I co-edited Montesquieu’s Science of Politics: Essays on the Spirit of Laws (2001), and was later the editor of Machiavelli’s Liberal Republican Legacy (2006). In recent years, I have become interested in French history, and in 2006 the Society for French Historical Studies awarded me the Koren Prize for the Best Article Published in French History the preceding year. In 2009, I published two books—Soft Despotism, Democracy’s Drift: Montesquieu, Rousseau, Tocqueville and the Modern Prospect, which was released on April 16, 2009, the 150th anniversary of Tocqueville’s death, and Montesquieu and the Logic of Liberty: War, Religion, Commerce, Climate, Terrain, Technology, Uneasiness of Mind, the Spirit of Political Vigilance, and the Foundations of the Modern Republic, which was released on September 22, 2009.

Research Interests: The history of self-government in ancient Greece and Rome, medieval and early modern Europe, and the United States.

I have two such classes: Thucydides and the Peloponnesian War, and Soft Despotism, Democracy's Drift.

Some years ago, I taught a seminar for a group of sophomores. On the first day, a young woman appeared—dressed (how shall I say?) in an outfit too scanty by far. When she first opened her mouth, I thought that I had a bubblehead on my hands. But when I read her first paper, I realized that she was exceptionally able. I remember adding a personal comment at the end of the paper—to the effect that she ought to value herself more for her intellect than she appeared to do. I feared at the time that I had overstepped. But that comment had a startling effect on her conduct. I have rarely been as pleased as I was when I attended her wedding, and I look forward to reading the Ph.D. dissertation that she is writing now.

It is what it pretends to be. It presents itself to the world as a liberal arts college devoted to liberal education. Today, there are many colleges that posture as such and very few that make good on what they promise. I have taught at Cornell University, Yale University, Franklin and Marshall College, and the University of Tulsa. Hillsdale does a better job of providing its students with a liberal education than any of these institutions. The faculty are devoted to teaching; the students are for the most part eager to learn. It is refreshing to be here.

If you want a degree without having to get an education, go elsewhere. We on the faculty will make your life a misery. If, however, you want a genuine education, Hillsdale College is an excellent place to be. Come expecting to have to work hard; come expecting an intense intellectual experience—in class and outside class as well. The school's isolation serves chiefly to intensify the on-campus experience.

They are upbeat. They do not whine. They know why they are here, and they are eager to get a better understanding of the world about them. They are morally serious and deeply curious.

prahe@hillsdale.edu