Fear of Enemies and Collective Action

What makes individuals with divergent and often conflicting interests join together and act in unison? By drawing on the fear of external threats, this book develops a theory of 'negative association' that examines the dynamics captured by the maxim 'The enemy of my enemy is my friend'. It then traces its role from Greek and Roman political thought, through Machiavelli and the reason of state thinkers, and Hobbes and his emulators and critics, to the realists of the twentieth century. By focusing on the role of fear and enmity in the formation of individual and group identity, this book reveals an important tradition in the history of political thought and offers insights into texts that are considered familiar. This book demonstrates that the fear of external threats is an essential element of the formation and preservation of political groups and that its absence renders political association unsustainable.

Prologue; Introduction; 1. Negative association; 2. 'Carthage must be saved'; 3. Enemies at the gates: Machiavelli's return to the beginnings of cities; 4. The enemy of my enemy is my friend: negative association and reason of state; 5. Survival through fear: Hobbes's problem and solution; 6. Hobbism; 7. The politics of enmity; Epilogue.

Explores the way in which the fear of enemies shapes political groups at their founding and helps to preserve them by consolidating them in times of crisis. It develops a theory of 'negative association' that examines the dynamics captured by the maxim 'The enemy of my enemy is my friend'.

Ioannis D. Evrigenis is Associate Professor Political Science, with a secondary appointment in Classics, at Tufts University, where he directs the Bodin Project. Fear of Enemies and Collective Action received the 2009 Delba Winthrop Award for Excellence in Political Science. Evrigenis is also coeditor of Herder's Another Philosophy of History and Selected Political Writings.