W.E.B. Du Bois’s critique of Radical Reconstruction : A Hegelian approach to American modernity

Philosophy and Social Criticism 45 (2):168-185 (2018)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

In this essay, I argue that Hegel’s model of ethical life is normatively gripping for Du Bois’s critique of Radical Reconstruction. My argument proceeds in three steps. First, I use Du Bois’s insights to explain the nature of progressive political change in historical time, an account Hegel lacks. I reconstruct the normative basis of Du Bois's political critique by articulating the three essential features of public reasoning qua citizenship. Second, I defend the promise of black civic enfranchisement with respect to the institutional conditions of love and labour in the wake of the Civil War. Third, I establish the central role black freedmen played in realizing the ideals of democratic self-governance affirmed in principle but seldom realized in practice in the United States.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,616

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Darkwater’s Democratic Vision.Lawrie Balfour - 2010 - Political Theory 38 (4):537-563.
W.E.B. Du Bois and the Sorrow Songs.Kristin McCartney - 2009 - Radical Philosophy Review 12 (1-2):79-86.
Confessing Race: Toward a Global Ecclesiology after Bonhoeffer and Du Bois.David S. Robinson - 2016 - Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics 36 (2):121-139.

Analytics

Added to PP
2018-09-26

Downloads
51 (#277,647)

6 months
6 (#202,901)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Elvira Basevich
University of California, Davis

Citations of this work

No citations found.

Add more citations

References found in this work

No references found.

Add more references