Female Ambition in Seventeenth-Century English Political Thought

• Applicant: Dr. Geertje Bol, Ph.D.
• Subject Area: Political Science ; Early Modern History ; History of Philosophy
• Term: since 2026
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 577211856

For much of Western history, ambition was seen not as a virtue but as a dangerous vice. This began to change in the seventeenth century, when ambitious men were increasingly described as energetic, virtuous, and useful to society. Yet ambitious women remained deeply problematic: they were widely viewed as unnatural, vain, or even threatening. This project examines this double standard in seventeenth-century England—a period when attitudes toward ambition were undergoing major change. Men benefited from a new, more positive understanding of ambition, but women were largely excluded. At the same time, however, several pioneering female authors—Rachel Speght, Margaret Cavendish, Mary Astell, and Judith Drake—challenged this view. In their writings, they redefined ambition not as a sin but as a strength: as the pursuit of knowledge and learning, as a source of moral virtue, or as the basis for social and political reform. The project has two main goals. First, it reconstructs how female ambition was portrayed in the political, religious, and literary culture of seventeenth-century England. Second, it shows how early feminist thinkers reinterpreted ambition as a resource for women’s equality, dignity, and participation in public life. In bringing to light a neglected strand of early feminism, the project enriches the history of political thought and the history of feminism, where scholars have largely overlooked ambition. It also offers valuable resources for rethinking ambition today.

• DFG Programme: Position