Alan Ebenstein, William Ebenstein and Edwin Fogelman

“ This political emphasis in human affairs has one main shortcoming: it tends to exaggerate the relative role that most people assign to government and politics in the total setting of their lives. It is natural that statesmen, politicians, and political philosophers see in politics the most important single element in human relations, and in political remedies the most important answer to human troubles. But human nature and human problems are more intricate than politics; politics is only one approach-and not always the most penetrating one-among many others. ”

“ A second dominant pre-Marxist approach to the understanding of human history was political: great emperors, kings, legislators, and soldiers were viewed as the decisive forces in history, and historical writing was largely records of kings, parliaments, wars, and peace treaties. ”