Company Rules: Burke, Hastings, and the Specter of the Modern Liberal State

This essay considers Edmund Burke's prosecution of Warren Hastings in the context of Burke's concerns about the Company's feudal structure, which was exacerbated under Hastings's tenure. Taking up the longstanding association of Burke with tradition in general, and with ad hoc apologia for Britain's feudal past in particular, I suggest, by contrast, that in his observations about Hastings's rule and the Company's monopoly, Burke offers a trenchant critique of the feudal logic that underwrites this historical moment of capitalism's imprinting.