403 research outputs found
Power as Control and the Therapeutic Effects of Hegel’s Logic
Rather than approaching the question of the constructive or therapeutic
character of Hegel’s Logic through a global consideration of its argument and its
relation to the rest of Hegel’s system, I want to come at the question by
considering a specific thread that runs through the argument of the Logic, namely
the question of the proper understanding of power or control. What I want to try
to show is that there is a close connection between therapeutic and constructive
elements in Hegel’s treatment of power. To do so I will make use of two deep
criticisms of Hegel’s treatment from Michael Theunissen. First comes
Theunissen’s claim that in Hegel’s logical scheme, reality is necessarily dominated
by the concept rather than truly reciprocally related to it. Then I will consider
Theunissen’s structurally analogous claim that for Hegel, the power of the
concept is the management of the suppression of the other. Both of these claims
are essentially claims about the way in which elements of the logic of reflection
are modified and yet continue to play a role in the logic of the concept
Philosophy of Action
There are a number of questions, the answers to which define specific theoretical
approaches to Hegel’s philosophy of action. To begin with, does Hegel attempt to
give a theory of free will that responds to the naturalistic skepticism so prevalent in
the history of modern philosophy? Though some scholars hold that he is interested
in providing such a theory, perhaps the majority view is that Hegel instead socializes
his conception of the will such that the traditional naturalistic worries are no longer
germane.1 A second question is: does Hegel have a theory of action as such that
competes with those found in the history of modern philosophy and more
particularly in the Anglophone literature from the mid-20th century onwards?
Though perhaps the majority view is that Hegel does have such a theory of action, it
is commonly held to be independent of any commitments to a conception of free
will, and to take a form radically different from the other offerings in the literature
in virtue of introducing and essentially retrospective rather than prospective
relation between the agent and her action
Talents and Interests: A Hegelian Moral Psychology
One of the reasons why there is no Hegelian school in contemporary ethics in the way that there are Kantian, Humean and Aristotelian schools is because Hegelians have been unable to clearly articulate the Hegelian alternative to those schools’ moral psychologies, i.e., to present a Hegelian model of the motivation to, perception of, and responsibility for moral action. Here it is argued that in its most basic terms Hegel's model can be understood as follows: the agent acts in a responsible and thus paradigmatic sense when she identifies as reasons those motivations which are grounded in his or her talents and support actions that are likely to develop those talents in ways suggested by his or her interests
Hegels Handlungslehre und das Preußische Allgemeine Landrecht
Nach Reinhart Koselleck nennen Historiker die Periode der deutschen Geschichte
zwischen 1770 und 1830 ‚die Sattelzeit‘. So wird diese Periode mit einem Bergsattel
verglichen, der zwei Gipfel miteinander verbindet, die hier für die frühe Neuzeit und die Moderne stehen. Überall in Deutschland ist diese Periode von tiefgreifenden Reformen der Gesetze und der Verwaltung geprägt. Im Folgenden beschränke ich mich in meiner Darlegung auf Preußen, weil das Preußische Allgemeine Landrecht von 1794 wahrscheinlich das wichtigste Dokument war, durch das diese Reformen in historischer Perspektive begriffen werden können
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