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Hegel's Occasional Writings: State and Individual
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 August 2009
Extract
Perhaps the most basic and enduring theme in political philosophy is that which concerns the inherent tension between individual values and social values. Indeed, the task of reconciling, in thought, the individual and social is virtually a definition of political philosophy. Of course, in much secondary work, and some primary work as well, this basic task often gets lost in a maze of more particular considerations, including the analysis of moral principles and the elaboration of special institutional arrangements or particular causal patterns. Nonetheless, major theorists, virtually without exception, have recognized that the basic individual values (e.g., freedom, privacy, personal morality) may well be politically undesirable and, similarly, that the requirements of political life (e.g., order, obedience, ethical behavior) may significantly compromise individual goals.
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References
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17 In the following pages, I minimize differences between the various occasional writings themselves. There can be no doubt that such differences exist, but their exact nature and relevance are unclear. The best analysis I know of is offered by Jürgen Habermas, “Nachwort,” pp. 343–370 in Hegel, G. W. F., Politische Schriften (Frankfurt, 1966)Google Scholar. But while his argument is intriguing, I think it is also a bit farfetched. This is not the place for a treatment of such problems; suffice it to say that, in my judgment, differences between the occasional writings are less serious than Habermas indicates (even on the theory-practice issue) and, further, that these differences are largely irrelevant to the argument of the present essay.
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30 Philosophy of Right, p. 175.
31 Pelczynski, “Introductory Essay,” p. 80.
32 “The German Constitution,” p. 234.
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34 See Philosophy of Right, p. 106.
35 “The German Constitution,” p. 154.
36 Ibid., p. 155.
37 Ibid., p. 161.
38 Philosophy of Right, p. 12.
39 Ibid., p. 39.
40 Ibid., p. 161.
41 “Württemberg,” p. 254.
42 Ibid., pp. 264–65.
43 Ibid., p. 263.
44 Ibid., p. 251.
45 Here again, as in the case of the consistency issue, Habermas's “Nachwort” is most enlightening; only in the present instance, our positions are more clearly in accord.
46 Philosophy of Right, p. 175.
47 Ibid., p. 191.
48 Ibid., p. 190.
49 Ibid., p. 190.
50 Ibid., p. 203.
51 Ibid., pp. 199–200.
52 Ibid., p. 175.
53 Ibid., p. 197.
54 Ibid., p. 192.
55 Ibid., p. 196.
56 Ibid., p. 109.
57 Ibid., p. 91–92.
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68 Ibid., p. 59.
69 See, for example, Ilting, “The Structure of Hegel's Philosophy of Right.”
70 Avineri, Hegel's Theory of the Modern State, pp. 128–29.
71 Philosophy of Right, p. 12.