Preface

I have accumulated a great many debts over the dozen years in which I have been working on the history of international thought. The most fundamental is to Knud Haakonssen for his generous invitation to deliver the 2003 Robert P. Benedict Lectures in the History of Political Philosophy at Boston University; he and Jim Schmidt were exemplary hosts for that stimulating series. My only regret is that a published version of the lectures was so long in coming and that it has not arrived in the form Knud, or indeed I, had originally anticipated. To deliver the Benedict Lectures, I took a semester’s leave from my duties at Columbia University: belated but heartfelt thanks to David Johnston and Jim Zetzel for shouldering the extra burdens my absence created.

Three other opportunities allowed me to pursue my themes. The first was a fellowship at the Charles Warren Center for Studies in American History at Harvard University in 2000–1, where Akira Iriye, Jim Kloppenberg and the late Ernest May led a year of unforgettable discussions with a remarkable group of fellow Warren Fellows. The second was the chance to lead a seminar under the auspices of the Center for the History of British Political Thought at the Folger Shakespeare Library in 2002. I am deeply grateful to John Pocock for that invitation and for his penetrating contributions to the seminar, as well as to all the participants for the light they shed on the early modern foundations of international thought. And the third was Barry Hindess’s kind suggestion to spend some weeks in 2004 as a Visiting Fellow in the Research School of Social Sciences at the Australian National University, where I enjoyed many memorable exchanges with Barry and his collaborators.