The nature of corporate agency has become a more pressing subject for philosophers and political theorists. The claim that multinational corporations possess the same civil and international rights as individuals prompts reflection on whether it is possible to recognize corporations as distinctive kinds of agents, while acknowledging the key differences between the moral properties of natural persons and those of corporations. This seminar examines how philosophers and political thinkers since the early modern period have characterized the distinctive agency and personality of collective entities like states and corporations, and the implications of ideas of personhood and rights for contemporary understandings of the role of states in the world, the power of corporations, and the emerging significance of AI in modern politics. Through a study of ideas of personhood, we will also consider the broader relationship between legal concepts and social and political reality. Readings include Hobbes, Gierke, Maitland, Kantorowicz and Pettit.