Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-75dct Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-01T14:06:50.940Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Hegel on Intersubjective and Retrospective Determination of Intention

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 June 2015

Arto Laitinen
Arto Laitinen*
Affiliation:
University of Jyväskylä
Get access

Abstract

Does Hegel's social philosophy leave sufficient room for individual agents, or does the Hegelian vision of self-actualising Geist ultimately swallow up individuals in an over-collectivist and all-too-metaphysical system? It depends of course on what is ‘sufficiently’ individualist and what is ‘too’ collectivist or ‘too’ metaphysical. It is common knowledge that Hegel at least tries to avoid one-sided extremes: with concepts like recognition, ethical life and objective spirit, Hegel tried to develop a view, which gives both individuality and sociality their due. To judge how well Hegel succeeds is a matter of detailed analyses. In this paper I focus on one specific topic: intentional action, or more specifically, Hegel's views on the idea of retrospective and intersubjective determination of intention.

The main point is to distinguish four perspectives on human action: 1) The agent's ‘moral’ perspective and the understanding and description under which the agent acted; from this perspective we can thematise the operative intention-in-action and distinguish ‘action’ from ‘deed’. 2) The agent's retrospective awareness and appropriation of the action: was what I did really justified and did it express my true goals? 3) The retrospective takes of others concerning the action, from within relevant social practices and the prevailing Sittlichkeit. 4) The perspective of Reason or Idea as emerging in world history.

Type
Hegel and Social Philosophy
Information
Bulletin of the Hegel Society of Great Britain , Volume 25 , Issue 1-2: number 49/50 , 2004 , pp. 54 - 72
Copyright
Copyright © The Hegel Society of Great Britain 2004

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anscombe, G.E.M. (1957) Intention. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Danto, Arthur C. (1973) Analytical Philosophy of Action. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Davidson, Donald (1980) Essays on Actions and Events. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Dreyfus, Hubert (1996) ‘The Current Relevance of Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Embodiment’. The Electronic Journal of Analytic Philosophy 4.Google Scholar
Hegel, G.W.F. (1969ff) Werke in Zwanzig Bänden. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp.Google Scholar
Hegel, G.W.F. (1969) The Science of Logic [SL] (Trans. Miller, A.V.). London: George Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
Hegel, G.W.F. (1956) The Philosophy of History [PH] (Trans. Sibree, J.). New York: Dover.Google Scholar
Hegel, G.W.F. (1971) Hegel's Philosophy of Mind, Part 3 of the Encyclopaedia of the Philosophical Sciences [E] (Trans. Wallace, W. and Miller, A.V.). Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Hegel, G.W.F. (1977) Phenomenology of Spirit [PS] (Trans. Miller, A. V.). Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Hegel, G.W.F. (1991) Elements of The Philosophy of Right [PR] Trans. Nisbet, H. B.). Cambridge. Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Honneth, Axel (1995) The Struggle for Recognition. Cambridge: Polity.Google Scholar
Ikäheimo, Heikki (2002) ‘On the Genus and Species of Recognition’. Inquiry, 45: 4, pp. 447–462.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Knowles, Dudley (2002) Hegel and The Philosophy of Right. London: Roudedge.Google Scholar
Laitinen, Arto (2002) ‘Interpersonal Recognition — a Response to Value or a Precondition of Personhood?’ Inquiry 45: 4, pp. 463–478.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Laitinen, Arto (2003) Strong Evaluation Without Sources. Jyväskylä: University of Jyväskylä. Studies in Education, Psychology and Social Research 224.Google Scholar
Pettit, Philip (2001) A Theory of Freedom. From the Psychology to the Politics of Agency. Cambridge: Polity.Google Scholar
Pippin, Robert B. (1989) Hegel's Idealism. The Satisfactions of Self-Consciousness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pippin, Robert B. (2004) ‘Recognition and Reconciliation in Hegel's Phenomenology’ [RR]. International Yearbook of German Idealism, 2, pp. 249–267.Google Scholar
Pippin, Robert B. (2004) ‘Taking Responsibility. Hegel on Agency’ in Merker, Barbara, Mohr, Georg, and Quante, Michael (eds.) Subjektivität und Anerkennung (Festschrifi for Ludwig Sief). Paderborn: Mentis.Google Scholar
Quante, Michael (1993) Hegel's Begriff der Handlung. Spekulation und Erfahrung. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Frommann-Holzboog.Google Scholar
Ricoeur, Paul (1970) Freud and Phibsophy. An Essay in Interpretation. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Searle, John (1983) Intentionahty: An Essay in the Phibsophy of Mind. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Searle, John (1990) ‘Collective Intentions and Actions’ in Cohen, Philip R., Morgan, Jerry, and Pollack, Martha E. (eds.) Intentions in Communication. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Siep, Ludwig (1979) Anerkennung als Prinzip der praktischen Philosophie: Untersuchungen zu Hegels Jenaer Phihsophie des Geistes. Freiburg: Karl Alber Verlag.Google Scholar
Siep, Ludwig (2000) Der Weg der Phänomenobgie des Geistes. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp.Google Scholar
Stern, Robert (2002) Hegel and the Phenomenology of Spirit. London: Roudedge.Google Scholar
Taylor, Charles (1964) The Explanation of Behaviour. London and New York: Roudedge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Taylor, Charles (1975) Hegel. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, Charles (1979) ‘Action as Expression’ in Diamond, C. and Teichman, J. (eds.) Intention and Intentionahty: Essays in Honour of G. E. M. Anscombe. London: Harvester Press.Google Scholar
Taylor, Charles (1983) ‘Hegel and the philosophy of action’ in Stepelevich, Lawrence S. and Lamb, David (eds.) Hegel's Philosophy of Action. Adantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities Press.Google Scholar
Taylor, Charles (1985) ‘Hegel's Philosophy of Mind’ in Human Agency and Language. Philosophical Papers 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [A slighdy modified version of Taylor 1983.]CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, Charles (1991) Ethics of Authenticity. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Velleman, David (1997) ‘How to Share an Intention’. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research LVII: 1, pp. 29–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, Robert R. (1992) Recognition: Fichte and Hegel on the Other. Albany: SUNY Press.Google Scholar
Williams, Robert R. (1997) Hegel's Ethics of Recognition. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
von Wright, G.H. (1963a) Norm and Action. London: Roudedge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
von Wright, G.H. (1963b) The Varieties of Goodness. London: Roudedge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar