Hobbes and Lenin: from the Genesis to the Extinction of the State

Abstract

Thomas Hobbes is the main architect of the modern conception of political  sovereignty and, consequently, of its articulation in what will become the modern state.  His political philosophy would seek mechanisms for the maintenance of the conditions  of sovereignty, conceived as the only guarantee for peaceful coexistence in civil soci ety. On the other hand, almost two and a half centuries later, Vladimir I. U. Lenin will  systematise the contributions of Marx and Engels on the Marxist theory of the state,  in which it is defined as a machinery, dictatorship or special organisation or force of  repression of one class by another, proposing its seizure by the oppressed class and,  ultimately, its extinction towards the overcoming of social conflict. We are thus faced  with two historical and philosophical moments in the genealogy of the modern state,  namely the theory of its genesis in Hobbes and the theory of its extinction in Lenin.  Both Hobbes and Lenin start from the same premise: the real conflict in the present; and  the same purpose: to achieve peace among human beings.