When 'Citizen' Meant City-Dweller: The Urbanization of Political Membership
How a medieval urban privilege became the foundation of modern political identity—and what was lost in translation
The Concept of 'Sovereignty' and the Making of the Modern State
How a sixteenth-century conceptual innovation created the modern state and continues to shape contemporary political possibilities
The Invention of 'Ideology': From Science of Ideas to False Consciousness
How a term coined to name Enlightenment science became modernity's master concept for unmasking power disguised as truth
The Concept of 'Crisis' and the Modern Experience of Historical Time
How the decisive moment stretched into permanent emergency and reshaped modern political consciousness
The Concept of 'Progress' and the Secularization of Christian Eschatology
How the modern faith in historical improvement emerged from—and never fully escaped—Christian expectations of salvation
When 'Revolution' Meant Going in Circles: The Concept Before Modern Politics
How a word for celestial orbits became the master concept of political rupture and historical transformation
From 'Police' to 'Policy': The Transformation of State Action
How a word that once meant comprehensive governance came to mean law enforcement—and what this reveals about the transformation of state power.
How 'Nation' Migrated from Birth to Will: The Transformation of Political Community
Tracing how the nation transformed from a community of shared ancestry into a political subject possessing sovereignty and collective will
The Strange Career of 'Liberal': From Aristocratic Virtue to Political Ideology
How a compliment about generosity became the most contested word in modern political vocabulary across two turbulent centuries
How 'Democracy' Lost Its Pejorative Meaning and Became the Universal Political Ideal
From ancient mob rule to universal legitimation: how democracy's meaning transformed and why that transformation produced perpetual contestation
How 'Culture' Became the Opposite of Civilization
How a German counter-concept transformed synonyms into antagonists, reshaping how we understand authenticity, progress, and human diversity
The Birth of 'Society' as Something Separate from the State
How eighteenth-century thinkers invented the conceptual distinction between society and state that now structures all modern political thought
The Emergence of 'Public Opinion' as Political Tribunal
How an Enlightenment invention transformed common belief into a court of political judgment—and why that conceptual revolution still shapes democratic confusion today.
The Birth of 'Capitalism' as a Critical Concept
How nineteenth-century critics invented a word that made visible what had seemed like natural economic law, transforming scattered grievances into systemic critique.
How 'Class' Replaced 'Orders': The Reconfiguration of Social Hierarchy
Tracing the revolutionary shift from God-given orders to economic classes that transformed how we understand inequality, conflict, and the possibility of social transformation.