History & Politics · Top 50
Influential Political Thinker Rankings
Fifty of the most influential political thinkers in history with their lifespan.
World Ranking
▲ Top 5
#1
Plato (-427–-347)
Athenian philosopher whose Republic explored justice, the tripartite soul, and governance by philosopher-kings guided by the Allegory of the Cave.
+64
#2
Aristotle (-384–-322)
Pioneered empirical political science in Politics, classifying constitutional forms and arguing that man is by nature a political animal.
+48
#3
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527)
Florentine diplomat whose Prince founded modern political realism, arguing that political survival and state security necessitate pragmatic efficacy over moral idealism.
+33
#4
Karl Marx (1818–1883)
German philosopher and economist who developed historical materialism, critiqued capitalist surplus labor in Das Kapital, and advocated proletarian revolution in the Communist Manifesto.
+20
#5
John Locke (1632–1704)
Enlightenment philosopher whose Two Treatises of Government grounded governance in the consent of the governed and the protection of natural rights to life, liberty, and estate.
+18
▼ Bottom 5
#1
Jordan Peterson (1962– )
Canadian clinical psychologist who analyzed archetypal mythic structures in Maps of Meaning and advocated individual responsibility against ideological collectivism.
-67
#2
Yuval Noah Harari (1976– )
Historian who analyzed human societal cooperation through shared intersubjective fictions in Sapiens and examined technology's impact on democracy in Homo Deus.
-51
#3
Cornel West (1953– )
American public intellectual who synthesized Christian socialist theology, prophetic pragmatism, and critical race analysis in Race Matters.
-39
#4
Slavoj Žižek (1949– )
Slovenian philosopher who combined Lacanian psychoanalysis with Hegelian dialectics to deconstruct modern global capitalism, popular culture, and ideology.
-26
#5
Leo Strauss (1899–1973)
German-American classicist who revived classical political philosophy, contrasting ancient natural right with modern nihilism and exploring esoteric writing.
-13
You should check out
The Republic by Plato (Penguin Classics)
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The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli (Translated by Harvey C. Mansfield)
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A Theory of Justice by John Rawls
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All Items (50)
Plato (-427–-347)+64
Aristotle (-384–-322)+48
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527)+33
Karl Marx (1818–1883)+20
John Locke (1632–1704)+18
Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948)+14
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)+5
Immanuel Kant (1724–1804)+4
Confucius (-551–-479)+2
John Maynard Keynes (1883–1946)+1
Sun Tzu (-544–-496)—
Cicero (-106–-43)—
Augustine of Hippo (354–430)—
Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274)—
Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679)—
Baron de Montesquieu (1689–1755)—
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778)—
Edmund Burke (1729–1797)—
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)—
Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859)—
John Stuart Mill (1806–1873)—
Max Weber (1864–1920)—
Rosa Luxemburg (1871–1919)—
Antonio Gramsci (1891–1937)—
Carl Schmitt (1888–1985)—
Hannah Arendt (1906–1975)—
Isaiah Berlin (1909–1997)—
Karl Popper (1902–1994)—
Friedrich Hayek (1899–1992)—
John Rawls (1921–2002)—
Robert Nozick (1938–2002)—
Michel Foucault (1926–1984)—
Jürgen Habermas (1929– )—
Simone de Beauvoir (1908–1986)—
Frantz Fanon (1925–1961)—
Edward Said (1935–2003)—
Amartya Sen (1933– )—
Martha Nussbaum (1947– )—
Noam Chomsky (1928– )—
Thomas Piketty (1971– )—
Kwame Nkrumah (1909–1972)—
Milton Friedman (1912–2006)-1
Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832)-3
Friedrich Engels (1820–1895)-4
Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924)-5
Leo Strauss (1899–1973)-13
Slavoj Žižek (1949– )-26
Cornel West (1953– )-39
Yuval Noah Harari (1976– )-51
Jordan Peterson (1962– )-67
Image credits (50)
- Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859) — Théodore Chassériau · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Amartya Sen (1933– ) — Amartya_Sen_20071128_cologne.jpg: Elke Wetzig ( Elya) derivative work: ChaudhryAzan ( talk) · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Antonio Gramsci (1891–1937) — Unknown author · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Aristotle (-384–-322) — After Lysippos · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Augustine of Hippo (354–430) — Philippe de Champaigne · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Baron de Montesquieu (1689–1755) — After Jacques-Antoine Dassier · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Carl Schmitt (1888–1985) — ABC · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Cicero (-106–-43) — José Luiz · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Confucius (-551–-479) — Anonymous Chinese painter of the Western Han period · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Cornel West (1953– ) — Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Edmund Burke (1729–1797) — Unknown author · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Edward Said (1935–2003) — Barenboim-Said Akademie gGmbH · CC0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Frantz Fanon (1925–1961) — Unknown author · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Friedrich Engels (1820–1895) — William Hall (1826–ca. 1898) (cropped and sepia tone removed) · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Friedrich Hayek (1899–1992) — The original uploader was DickClarkMises at English Wikipedia. · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) — Friedrich Hermann Hartmann · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) — Jakob Schlesinger · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Hannah Arendt (1906–1975) — Barbara Niggl Radloff · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) — Johann Gottlieb Becker (1720-1782) · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Isaiah Berlin (1909–1997) — Rob C. Croes (ANEFO) · CC0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778) — Maurice Quentin de La Tour (Life time: 1788) · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) — Henry William Pickersgill · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- John Locke (1632–1704) — Godfrey Kneller · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- John Maynard Keynes (1883–1946) — Unknown, dedicated to Bettmann Archive · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- John Rawls (1921–2002) — Published by the Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Photograph taken by Alec Rawls, John's son. The portrait was uncredited on the original dust jacket, but Alec is identified as its photographer on the copyright page of the 1994 German-language first edition of the book John Rawls by Thomas Pogge. · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- John Stuart Mill (1806–1873) — London Stereoscopic Company · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Jordan Peterson (1962– ) — Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Jürgen Habermas (1929– ) — photographer: Wolfram Huke at en.wikipedia, http://wolframhuke.de · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Karl Marx (1818–1883) — John Jabez Edwin Mayall · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Karl Popper (1902–1994) — Franz Barta · No restrictions · Wikimedia Commons
- Kwame Nkrumah (1909–1972) — The National Archives UK - Flickr account · OGL v1.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Leo Strauss (1899–1973) — Monozigote · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) — Elliott & Fry · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Martha Nussbaum (1947– ) — Sally Ryan, photographer, www.sallyryanphoto.com · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Max Weber (1864–1920) — Ernst Gottmann · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Michel Foucault (1926–1984) — Jerry Bauer · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Milton Friedman (1912–2006) — Bachrach Studios · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527) — Santi di Tito · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Noam Chomsky (1928– ) — Σ, retouched by Wugapodes and Jonnmann · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Plato (-427–-347) — Marie-Lan Nguyen · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Robert Nozick (1938–2002) — Libertarian Review · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Rosa Luxemburg (1871–1919) — Unknown author · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Simone de Beauvoir (1908–1986) — Moshe Milner · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Slavoj Žižek (1949– ) — Harald Krichel · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Sun Tzu (-544–-496) — Unknown author · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) — Carlo Crivelli · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) — John Michael Wright · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Thomas Piketty (1971– ) — Gobierno de Chile · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) — Unknown, presumably official · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Yuval Noah Harari (1976– ) — Martin Kraft · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons