My colleague, Dudley Knowles, who has died of cancer aged 67, was an influential political philosopher and Hegel scholar. Among his publications, Political Philosophy (2001) remains a widely read textbook. His most important contribution was Hegel and the Philosophy of Right (2002), a study of Elements of the Philosophy of Right, the work in which Hegel sets out most fully his moral and political philosophy.

Dudley’s understanding of Hegel arose from a certain temperamental affinity with his underlying liberal-communitarian ethics. Politically, Dudley was a one-nation social democrat long before the idea of one-nation politics was taken up on the left. Emotionally, he was always an old-Labour northerner.

He was born in Penwortham, Lancashire, the son of Margaret (nee Southward) and Arthur Knowles. Dudley and his twin brother, David, spent their free time as schoolboys walking and climbing in the Pennines and the Lake District. At the age of 16, they became members of the newly formed Pennine rescue team.

From Kirkham grammar school, Dudley went in 1966 to St John’s College, Oxford, moving the following year to the then Bedford College in the University of London. He spent his vacations in Glencoe, working at the Clachaig Inn, where he met his wife, Anne. They married in 1968. David also studied at London University, and after they graduated the brothers went to live in Glencoe. Dudley became manager of the Clachaig Inn, and David worked as a professional mountaineer and guide. They both joined the Glencoe mountain rescue team. Several of its members were local shepherds with whom Dudley forged lifelong friendships.

In Glencoe he studied for an MLitt at Glasgow University. On completing it, he accepted the offer of a lectureship in the university’s philosophy department. He and Anne, with their daughter, Katy, moved to Glasgow shortly after the death of their infant son, Graham. Their second daughter, Helen, was born there in 1974. Later in the year, David died, aged 27, in an accident on the north face of the Eiger, while filming The Eiger Sanction.

As professor of political philosophy at Glasgow, Dudley demonstrated great kindness and decency, but also a shrewdness about people that stood him in good stead as head of department and as warden of the Queen Margaret hall of residence.

After 38 years at the university, he retired in 2011 with Anne to Hassocks, West Sussex, to be near their daughters, carrying out surveys for the British Trust for Ornithology and exploring the Sussex Downs.

He is survived by his wife, daughters and five grandchildren.