Consisting of two essays, this work by a Harvard professor offers his thoughts on the idea of a social contract regulating people's behavior toward one another.

Following the tradition of classical liberalism, Kant's political philosophy and theory of justice focus on the relation between individual freedom, as the central value of political life, and the state, whose primary normative function is both to restrain and protect individual liberty. In this accessible interpretation of Kant's political philosophy, Allen D. Rosen focuses on the relation among justice, political authority (the state), and individual liberty. He offers interpretations of the ethical bases of Kant's view of justice, of the structure (...) of his taxonomy of duties, and of his understanding of social welfare legislation. Arguing against the grain of much recent scholarly commentary, Rosen asserts that Kant's principles of justice are direct corollaries of the Categorical Imperative and that Kant does not support an absolute or even near-absolute duty of obedience to governments. He also maintains that Kant has principled and important reasons for repudiating a right of revolution and that Kant is not, as he is almost always taken to be, an advocate of the nightwatchman or minimal state. The Kant that emerges from Rosen's pages is an appealing and surprisingly modern philosopher, whose preoccupation with individual freedom still resonates in contemporary political and philosophical debates, and whose attempts to define the proper limits of individual liberty remain relevant even at the end of the twentieth century. (shrink)

Liberal democracy has long been recognized ‘in principle’ as the political project of modern times. This is not a political philosophy of which we can say that it has followed the words of Hegel and taken flight only with the falling of the dusk. Rather it is a philosophy which observes the Aristotelian maxim that ‘the end aimed at is not knowledge but action’, and therefore concerns itself with a perspective from which the thought of its own recognition is still (...) in question. This thought is the one of international order. Here the figure of Kant steps forth in the role of philosophical and political avant-garde. (shrink)

Vor 200 Jahren erschien Kants Schrift "Zum ewigen Frieden". Zu einer der vordringlichsten, von der Philosophie aber häufig vernachlässigten Aufgaben der Politik stellt sie bis heute den wichtigsten klassischen Text dar. Kant entfaltet in ihm die philosophischen Grundlagen für eine internationale Rechts- und Friedensgemeinschaft. Gleichzeitig stellt er sich aber auch die Frage nach einer Vermittlung von normativer Theorie und politischer Praxis. In 12 Beiträgen wird Kants Text in diesem Band "entschlüsselt": interpretiert, auf seine systematische Überzeugungskraft und auf seine politische Tragweite (...) hin untersucht und in seinen und unseren sozialgeschichtlichen Kontext gestellt. (shrink)

This innovative study focuses on the Kantian theory of international relations, a subject which has frequently been either ignored or misunderstood. Kant was criticized by contemporaries who asserted that his political ideas were idealistic and impractical. He countered this accusation by evolving a political philosophy which formed a link between the theoretical doctrine of pure law and the actualities of the real world. The author argues that Kant’s theory of international relations can be read as an attempt to bring reason (...) and history together. Kant tries to apply the a priori principles of reason to history in general, and to the political conditions of the late eighteenth century in particular, and this volume examines the way in which he attempts to mediate between theory and practice. In this stimulating and lucid work, Cavallar provides one of the first comprehensive examinations in English of Kant’s theory of international right. (shrink)

The goal of this study is to reconstruct and evaluate the systematic role of Kant's views on history within his ‛critical' philosophy. Kant's philosophy of history has been neglected in the literature, largely due to the widespread though mistaken perception that it is at odds with central assumptions of Kant’s ‘critical’ thought. I discuss Kant's most important texts on history and examine the relationship between Kant's view of history and the central tenets of his Critiques (in particular, Kant's conception of (...) teleology, his notion of an 'interest of reason,' and the problem of the possibility of the highest good). I argue that Kant's philosophy of history should be seen as an integral (though not entirely unproblematic) part of his mature philosophy. I show this in part by correcting the standard view of Kant's philosophy of history, and in part by highlighting hitherto neglected aspects of his critical philosophy. (shrink)

In 1795 Immanuel Kant published an essay entitled "Toward Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch." The immediate occasion for the essay was the March 1795 signing of the Treaty of Basel by Prussia and revolutionary France, which Kant condemned as only "the suspension of hostilities, not a peace." In the essay, Kant argues that it is humankind's immediate duty to solve the problem of violence and enter into the cosmopolitan ideal of a universal community of all peoples governed by the rule (...) of law.The essay's two-hundredth anniversary, 1995, also marked the fiftieth anniversary of the end of World War II and of the establishment of the Charter of the United Nations. The essays in this volume were written for a conference held in Frankfurt in May 1995 to commemorate these three anniversaries. Together, the authors argue for the continued theoretical and practical relevance of the cosmopolitan ideals of Kant's essay. They also show that history has both confirmed and outstripped Kant's prognoses. As recent events have shown, we certainly have not emerged from the violence of the state of nature. Accelerating globalization also gives these reconstructions and reappraisals of Kant's cosmopolitan ideal a new urgency.Contributors : Karl-Otto Apel, Kenneth Baynes, James Bohman, Jürgen Habermas, David Held, Axel Honneth, Matthias Lutz-Bachmann, Thomas McCarthy, Martha Nussbaum. (shrink)

Does a global economy render the traditional nation-state obsolete? Does globalization threaten democratic life, or offer it new forms of expression? The German philosopher and social theorist Jurgen Habermas addresses these and other questions in this work.

Kant is often portrayed as the author of a rigid system of ethics in which adherence to a formal and universal principle of morality - the famous categorical imperative - is an end itself, and any concern for human goals and happiness a strictly secondary and subordinate matter. Such a theory seems to suit perfectly rational beings but not human beings. The twelve essays in this collection by one of the world's preeminent Kant scholars argue for a radically different account (...) of Kant's ethics. They explore an interpretation of the moral philosophy according to which freedom is the fundamental end of human action, but an end that can only be preserved and promoted by adherence to moral law. By radically revising the traditional interpretation of Kant's moral and political philosophy and by showing how Kant's coherent liberalism can guide us in current debates, Paul Guyer will find an audience across moral and political philosophy, intellectual history, and political science. (shrink)

I examine the consistency of Kant's notion of moral progress as found in his philosophy of history. To many commentators, Kant's very idea of moral development has seemed inconsistent with basic tenets of his critical philosophy. This idea has seemed incompatible with his claims that the moral law is unconditionally and universally valid, that moral agency is noumenal and atemporal, and that all humans are equally free. Against these charges, I argue not only that Kant's notion of moral development is (...) consistent, but also that the assumption of the possibility of moral progress is indispensible for Kant's moral theory. (shrink)

There are few ideas as important to the history of modern democracy as that of the nation as a political community. And yet, by comparison to its companion idea of political community as based upon the agreement of free and equal individuals, it remained until recently a marginal concern of liberal political theory. The aftermath of decolonization and the breakup of the Soviet empire, among other things, has changed that and brought it finally to the center of theoretical attention. And (...) once there, the deep-seated tensions in theory between nationalism and liberalism have proved to be as hard to overlook as their all too familiar tensions in practice. (shrink)