How does skepticism serve history? What lessons does Hegel hold for the modern historian? Why is an understanding of historical consciousness so important across the humanities? These are some of the questions we asked Richard Bourke, Professor of the History of Political Thought at the University of Cambridge. 

Publications mentioned in this episode include: 

István Hont and Michael Ignatieff, Wealth and Virtue: The Shaping of Political Economy in the Scottish Enlightenment (CUP: 1983)

Richard Bourke, Peace in Ireland: The War of Ideas (Pimlico: 2003)

Richard Bourke, Empire and Revolution: The Political Life of Edmund Burke (Princeton University Press: 2015)

Richard Bourke and Quentin Skinner, eds. History in the Humanities and Social Sciences (CUP: 2002)

Richard Bourke, Hegel’s World Revolutions (Princeton University Press: forthcoming, 2023)