ABSTRACT
The philosophical tradition of Idealism, which is the starting point of Oakeshott’s philosophy, has a long and rich pedigree. If its development is followed, not only are the twists and turns of one particular philosophical school revealed but also the expansion of some of the most significant framing concepts of Western philosophy. Idealism is one of the ‘grand’ traditions of philosophy. Since the Enlightenment it has been fighting the battle for theoretical supremacy with, first, rationalism and, later, empiricism.1 At the time that Oakeshott began to publish, the old antagonisms were firmly in place. But the character of his work and that of his contemporaries was to alter the shape of philosophical debate up to and including the present time.
