Poliittisen teoria- ja käsitehistorian suomalainen suuntaus : Askelia kohti analyysiä

Authors

• Pertti Ahonen

Abstract

In the course of thirty years, an orientation in the study of the history of political theory and conceptual history has arisen in Finland around Professor Kari Palonen. In the article, first, the orientation is positioned within political science as en enterprise likened to work of early sophist philosophers, which has been done also by its representatives themselves. Second, despite – but also because – within the orientation its hermeneutic nature is denied in word, a dialogicalphilosophical hermeneutic approach is adopted as a perspective to analyse it. Third, some of the metaconcepts used within the orientation are given a treatment analogous to that given to political concepts within the orientation’s work, namely politicisation and historicisation. Importantly, this concerns ‘nominalist’ vs. ‘essentialist’ concepts and concepts related to ‘contingency’.