Old Wine in New Wineskins: William Ockham and the Common Good in Context

I first show an example of Ockham’s usage of “the common good” as a criterion in the classification of different constitutions. Such usage goes back to an established tradition, while sections three and especially four deal with functions of the common good that are more peculiar to him. The common good as a limit to the power of secular rulers and also to papal plenitudo potestatis, which is the object of section three. Section four is tightly connected to one of the main tenets of Ockham’s political thought. What is usually the best institutional form can prove to be inadequate to safeguard the common good in a peculiar situation: therefore, political theory can allow for exceptional cases that require exceptional solutions. It seems to me that in Ockham’s political works, the common good functions as a “conceptual device” that relativizes the conclusions of philosophical analysis in the f ield of political theory. The last part argues that the originality of Ockham’s contri bution lies more in the usage of the common good than in the way he conceives of it.