BODIN, JEAN (153o-1596), French political philosopher, was born at Angers in 153o. Having studied law at Toulouse and lectured there on jurisprudence, he settled in Paris as an advocate. In 1588, in refutation of the views of the seigneur de Malestroit, comptroller of the mint, who maintained that there had been no rise of prices in France during the three preceding centuries, he published his Responsio ad Paradoxa Malestretti (Reponse aux paradoxes de M. Malestroit), which explained the revolution in prices which took place in the i6th century. Bodin showed a more rational appreciation than many of his contemporaries of the causes of this revolution. This tract, the Discours sur les causes de l'extreme cherte qui est aujourdhuy en France (1574), and the disquisition on public revenues in the sixth book of the De la Republique (1577) entitle Bodin to a distinguished position among the earlier economists.
His learning, genial disposition and conversational powers won him the favour of Henry III., and of his brother, the duc d'Alen con; and he was appointed king's attorney at Laon in 1576. In this year he represented the tiers etat of Vermandois in the states general of Blois, and contended with skill and boldness in ex tremely difficult circumstances for freedom of conscience, justice and peace. The nobility and clergy favoured the league, and urged the king to force his subjects to profess the Catholic religion. When Bodin found he could not prevent this resolution being carried, he contrived to get inserted in the petition drawn up by the states, the clause "without war," which practically rendered nugatory all its other clauses. While he thus resisted the clergy and nobility he opposed the king's demand to be allowed to alien ate the public lands and royal demesnes. In 1581 he acted as secretary to the duc d'Alencon when that prince came over to England to seek the hand of Queen Elizabeth. Here he had the pleasure of finding that the Republique was studied at London and Cambridge, although in a barbarous Latin translation. This determined him to translate his work into Latin himself (1586). The latter part of Bodin's life was spent at Laon, which he is said to have persuaded to declare for the league in 1589, and for Henry IV. five years afterwards. He died of the plague in 150.
With all his breadth and liberality of mind Bodin was a cred ulous believer in witchcraft, the virtues of numbers and the power of the stars, and in 158o he published the Demonomanie des, sorciers.
Boden's Six livres de la Republique (1576), translated into Latin by himself (1586), though it is said to be the beginning of the science of political economy, was only an incidental part of a larger scheme for a book on the universe. Bodin did not write the Republic from the point of view of an impartial philosopher. It was his intention to be very practical—not only to describe the ideal state, but also to establish detailed reforms in France. Two altogether distinct ideas stand out : his conception of sov ereignty and his theory of climate. Sovereignty, he says, arises from human needs, and not from God—a hit at the Divine Right of Kings. He conceives of the state as an association of families which recognize unlimited law-making power in some person or group. The family is thus the corner-stone of the state, and the father, as its head, has absolute power, even of life and death, over his children. It must have property attached to it which, Bodin inconsistently says, the king may not take without the father's consent; hence if direct taxation is necessary the king must ask for a grant.
Bodin held that the main types of humanity, their laws and institutions, correspond to three climatic zones: the north, cold and dry, which produces a stupid but physically vigorous type tending towards democratic forms of government; the south which, being very hot, is peopled by intelligent but lazy, and consequently, politically passive races, usually governed by a theocracy or some form of despotism ; and lastly, the central zone where the climate is temperate, and . where, as in the case of France, the favourite form of government is a true monarchy.