Political friendship: Gardens, bees and Patrick Hayden
| Date | 01 February 2021 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1755088220972133 |
| Published date | 01 February 2021 |
| Author | Gabriella Slomp |
| Subject Matter | Roundtable on Patrick Hayden |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1755088220972133
Journal of International Political Theory
2021, Vol. 17(1) 11 –13
© The Author(s) 2021
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DOI: 10.1177/1755088220972133
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Political friendship: Gardens,
bees and Patrick Hayden
Gabriella Slomp
University of St Andrews, UK
There are three types of researchers, according to Francis Bacon: ‘empirics’, ‘dogmati-
cal’ and philosophers. The first, ‘like ants only heap up and use their store’; the second
‘like spiders spin out their own webs’; and the third, like bees, take a middle course:
The bee, a mean between both [ant and spider], extracts matter from the flowers of the garden
and the field, but works and fashions it by its own effort. The true labor of philosophy resembles
hers. . . (Bacon, 1902: 48 emphasis added))
There is no doubt in my mind that my friend and colleague Patrick Hayden is a bee-
researcher; in this short note I am going to make my case by concentrating on one exam-
ple: his excellent article on political friendship (Hayden, 2015: 745−764). For sure, in
that essay Patrick does not emulate ant-researchers and limit himself to relate thoughts
and ideas about friendship exposed by others, nor does he imitate spider-writers and
propose a conception of political friendship that neglects 2500 years of thinking about
the relationship. Rather, like the Baconian bee, he combines expertise with ingenuity.
To begin with, he offers an overview of the terrain that he intends to explore as well
as an account of the weather conditions; he notes that recent times have witnessed a
warming up of interest in two ideas that have a long history in the western tradition,
namely the concepts of ‘friendship’ and ‘recognition’. He points out that there has been
‘little cross-fertilisation’ of the two themes in [international] political theory, and that his
aim is ‘to contribute to the project of building conceptual bridges between theories of
political friendship and theories of recognition’ (p. 746).
As a second step, in search of the nectar of friendship and recognition, Patrick flies
over large fields and meadows; he explores Cicero’s hortus, Aquinas’ orchard,
Montaigne’s secret backyard, Kant’s landscaping grounds, Hegel’s national park; in all
these places, and others, he finds the tendency of describing friendship as a relationship
of self and other:
Corresponding author:
Gabriella Slomp, University of St Andrews, TheArts Building, St Andrews, KY16 9AJ, UK.
Email: gs21@st-andrews.ac.uk
972133IPT0010.1177/1755088220972133Journal of International Political TheorySlomp
review-article2021
Roundtable on Patrick Hayden
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