The main critical thrust of this book is the familiar rejoinder that analytic philosophy is ahistorical---both in the sense that it does not take seriously the historical developments of ideas, but also it assumes that its subjects of study can be understood without recourse to historical development. This seems especially pernicious in political philosophy, where the concept of (subjective) rights and justice take particular shapes, in Nozick’s and Rawls’s thought respectively, without discussion of why political enquiry should begin on this foundation at all (Nozick with the idea of subjective rights) or of alternative conceptions of justice and its relationship with other principles that other societies have employed (Rawls, e.g. Roman conceptions of justice are about what particular kinds of people deserve, so that a master treating his slave inhumanely would be just because the slave putatively deserves nothing from his master).
Geuss wants to move away from ethical intuitions underwriting political theories and instead wants to ground political theory in discussion of power---away from “neo-Kantianism” to “neo-Leninism.” Given any social phenomenon, Lenin thinks the most salient question to be asked is “for whom is this being done and for what reason?” Political theory must start here, not on abstract ethical principles.