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Neorepublican treatments of Hobbes argue that his conception of liberty was deliberately developed to counter a revived and Roman-rooted republican theory of liberty. In doing so, Hobbes rejects republican liberty, and, with it, Roman republicanism. We dispute this narrative and argue that rather than rejecting Roman liberty, per se, Hobbes identifies and attacks a language of liberty, Roman in character, often abused by ambitious persons. This is possible because Roman liberty—and, by extension, Hobbes's relationship to it—is more complex than neorepublican authors have allowed. Drawing on Roman sources, along with Hobbes's major works, we argue that Hobbes's theory of liberty owes much to his engagement with Roman sources, and that this theory speaks to the egalitarian elements in his political thought.

The final essay of a symposium on Bertrand de Jouvenel contends that his "conservative liberal" position bridged the liberal-communitarian divide. Jouvenel's thinking is said to be characterized by unresolved tension between a "progressive" confidence in dynamic society & "classical" skepticism about the moral consequences of modernity. He maintained that liberty resulted from a natural order of things & could not be based on assumptions about the individual or collective rule. Jouvenel believed the problem of liberty & the common good centered on whether or not the notion of the common good could be freed from corollaries like homogeneity & resistance to innovation that are endemic to classical political philosophy. His insights on Benjamin Constant's (1918) view of the "liberty of the ancients and the moderns" are examined, along with Jouvenel's notion of the common good as a "question that arises naturally" in response to political authority; his critique of communitarian illusions; & his argument that man's liberty/dignity depend on acceptance of his status as a dependent being. J. Lindroth

AbstractOne key area in which international humanitarian law (IHL) needs strengthening is the protection of persons deprived of their liberty in relation to non-international armed conflicts (NIACs). While the Geneva Conventions contain more than 175 rules regulating deprivation of liberty in relation to international armed conflicts in virtually all its aspects, no comparable legal regime applies in NIAC. Since 2011, States and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) have worked jointly on ways to strengthen IHL protecting persons deprived of their liberty. Between 2011 and 2015, the ICRC facilitated consultations to identify options and recommendations to strengthen detainee protection in times of armed conflict; since 2015, the objective of the process has shifted towards work on one or more concrete and implementable outcomes. The present note recalls the legal need to strengthen detainee protection in times of NIAC and the main steps that have been taken over the past years to strengthen IHL.