The Political Discourse of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: Methodology and Research Prospects

Abstract

This review analyses The Political Discourse of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: Terms and Ideas, a monograph written by Anna Grześkowiak-Krwawicz. The work describes the main concepts of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth’s political language between 1569 and 1795. The study is mostly based on political literature, i. e. theoretical treatises and works devoted to relevant issues of the political life of the state. The author makes an attempt to create her own methodological approach, which consists of describing the political discourse of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth by analysing its basic concepts, i. e. “Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth”, “law”, “freedom”, “forma mixta” and “separation of powers”, “consent”, “virtue”, “patriotism”, and “ancientry”. The scholar notes the small role that the concepts of “sovereignty”, “state”, and “property” played in political discourse. The reviewer compliments the wide range of literature used by the author and the high level of generalisations, due to which the work is a successful attempt at synthesising existing historiographic knowledge. At the same time, the reviewer points out further prospects for studying the issue: the application of a comparative approach, consideration of the context of ancient thought, analysis of differences in the political language in various parts of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the evolution of political discourse, as well as a significant expansion of the research base.