ON DIVORCE

De Bonald, Louis; Davidson, Nicholas [Translator] [Editor]; Nisbet, Robert [Foreword]

ISBN 10: 0887384390 / ISBN 13: 9780887384394

Published by Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick & London, 1993

About this Item

Octavo,198 pages. In Very Good condition, with a Very Good dust jacket. Spine yellow with black lettering. Dust jacket shows mild shelf wear; Binding square and tight; Text block clean. English translation of Bonald's celebrated counter-revolutionary treatise on divorce and the family, originally published in French in 1801. Shelved in ND-A. 1412218. FP New Rockville Stock.

Seller Inventory # 1412218

Bibliographic Details

• Title: ON DIVORCE
• Publisher: Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick & London
• Publication Date: 1993
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0887384390
• ISBN 13: 9780887384394
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: Second Printing.
• Dust Jacket Condition: dj
• Seller catalogs:
  • Religion
  • Philosophy
  • Politics, Government, and Law

About this title

Synopsis

The publication of this work is a major event. Louis de Bonald was one of the three principal founders of conservatism, along with Edmund Burke and Joseph de Maistre. For the first time ever, one of Bonald's books has now been translated into English. Although Bonald was inspired by Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France, his approach differs sharply from Burke's. Where Burke is empiricist and conservative, Bonald is rationalist and reactionary.
In his preface, translator Nicholas Davidson argues that Burkean conservatism is incapable of dealing with an increasingly reformed world, and that hence it is Bonald, not Burke, who represents the key philosopher for the coming era. When the conditions of life have substantially been radicalized, tradition no longer provides a basis for resistance, but actually supports radicalism. It is then no longer enough to support tradition: it becomes necessary to analyze and articulate the principles that underlie fundamental social institutions.
For Bonald, human society is constituted of three interactive societies: religious society, domestic society or the family, and public society or the State. These societies, according to Bonald, operate on common principles and can only be analyzed in relation to one another. Since according to his view the family, not the individual, is the basic unit of society, divorce represents a fundamental assault on the social order. Bonald's influence has been felt across the political spectrum and in areas as diverse as political theory, sociology, and literature. The list of Bonald's admirers includes Necker, La Harpe, Chateaubriand, Napoleon, Sainte-Beuve, Lamennais, Saint-Simon, Comte, Proudhon, Maurras, and Balzac.
Of the highest possible interest to students of political philosophy, this work will be of equal value to those concerned with family issues, at a time when divorce has begun to assume a central place among American social questions.

About the Authors

Louis de Bonald (1754-1840) was the author of several highly original works of political philosophy and a formative influence on modern sociological thought. He was also a leading political figure of the French Restoration.
 

Nicholas Davidsonis the author of The Failure of Feminismand the editor of Gender Sanity, an anthology.

Robert A. Nisbet (1913-1996) was Albert Schweitzer Professor Emeritus of the Humanities at Columbia University. Some of his books include The Sociological Tradition, History of the Idea of Progress, and Metaphor and History.