This paper explores the primary causes or factors underlying cultural conflict in all its forms and seeks to answer the questions that follow. Why do people hate and wage wars against each other in the name of culture? Are cultural wars necessary or inherent in the very nature of culture as a phenomenon of human life? Can cultural differences be a justifiable cause of war? In my attempt to explicate and answer these questions, I shall first advance a concept of (...) culture. What do we mean when we speak of culture? What is the essential structure or building blocks of culture as a human phenomenon? The proposition I shall defend is that the tendency of animosity, tension, and conflict among people is not and cannot be inherent in their cultures. Accordingly, any claim that cultural difference is directly or indirectly a cause of cultural violence is not tenable, even though such violence may take place in the name of culture or cultural allegiance. But, if the tendency towards animosity, tension, or conflict is not inherent in the essential structure of culture, what might be the roots of the so-called cultural wars? The thesis I advance and elucidate in detail is that an answer to this question should proceed from an analysis of Socrates’s dictum that ignorance is the source of human evil. A discussion of this dictum and its implications, in the process of examining the roots of cultural wars, will reveal that the real culprits behind cultural conflicts are a cluster of political, intellectual, economic, psychological, and educational factors. (shrink)

Twenty scholars from around the world assembled at the Werner Reimer Stiftung in Bad Homburg from June 29 to July 1, 1995, to discuss the life and work of Eduard Gans. There has been a surge of interest in Gans in the past few years, and the authors of all recent work on Gans attended. Books circulated at the conference included Gans’ Chroniques françaises: Un hégélien juif à Paris, trans. by Myriam Bienenstock, ed. by Norbert Waszek ; Eduard Gans : (...) Hegelianer, Jude, Europäer: Text und Dokumente, ed. by Norbert Waszek ; Gans’ Rückblicke auf Personen und Zuständ: Berlin 1836, ed. by Norbert Waszek, and my own Eduard Gans and the Hegelian Philosophy of Law. An important recent article is Reinhard Blänkner, “‘Der Absolutismus war ein Glück der doch nicht zu den Absolutisten gehört’: Eduard Gans und die hegelianischen Ursprünge der Absolutismusforschung in Deutschland,” Historische Zeitschrift, 256 : 31–66. (shrink)

Mississippi Representative L.Q.C. Lamar was one of the most aggressive slavery supporters in Congress on the eve of the Civil War. Lamar had a personal stake in slavery, owning a plantation and 26 slaves in north Mississippi. In a speech delivered at the height of national debate on the slavery issue, Lamar attacked abolitionism and sought to justify slavery based on the supposed natural inferiority of blacks. His chief authority in the speech was Hegel.

This essay is an analytical, critical, and evaluative exploration of the roots of the crisis of ethical theory. By crisis, the author means a state of inner separation or alienation. In what sense is ethical theory separated or alienated from itself? What is the self from which it is alienated? The thesis the author defends is that the crisis of ethical theory is embedded in the crisis of philosophy, the crisis of philosophy is embedded in the crisis of culture, and (...) the crisis of culture is embedded in the growth and development of modernity. A theory is in crisis when it is alienated from its function. A theory’s reason for being is its function. Thus, an understanding of this kind of crisis should be attained in the context in which it has taken place, viz., the crisis of philosophy and the crisis of culture. This is based on the assumption that ethical theory is an integral part of philosophy and philosophy is an integral part of culture. (shrink)

First Published in 1993. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This paper will draw on Hegel’s writings in Jena from 1801 to 1804, especially the fragments for a philosophy of nature from 1803-04, to explore his sustained concern with the proper configuration of a system of nature. Hegel’s earliest treatment of nature sheds light on the role of nature in the system he published over a decade later. Moreover, the earliest system illuminates two problems posed by his later philosophy of nature-the relationship of nature and spirit, and the sequence and (...) organization of his treatment of illness and death. (shrink)

Despite its recent revival, the Victorian practice of translating Knechtschaft as “slavery” is questionable. First, it fails to preserve Hegel’s own distinction between Knechtschaft and Sklaverei, the normal German noun for slavery. Second, the English word “slavery” carries strong associations that are absent from Knechtschaft, and the English word fails to communicate important meanings of Hegel’s term. In the latest Hegel-Studien, I examine different cultural associations of the words. Here I want to propose a solution and to suggest some larger (...) interpretive issues posed by the reduction of Knechtschaft to slavery. (shrink)

This new translation of political writings by Hegel marks a major event in Hegel scholarship and provides a welcome opportunity to consider Dickey’s historical interpretation of Hegel’s political ideas and Nisbet’s translation strategies. It contains the best collection available of Hegel’s nonsystematic writings on political philosophy and provides a companion to the fine edition of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right that appears in the same series. The contents are arranged chronologically.

This paper uses the proxy evidence of relic inventories and labels to explore the role of relics in medieval Christianity. By means of an examination of their material nature, it argues that their primary characteristics were their fragmentary and often amorphous nature; their lack of intrinsic identification; and their easy portability. By emphasising that relic collecting was a habit that contributed to establishing religious identities and affiliations, the paper clarifies relics' role in relocating knowledge of Christian history into the homes (...) and churches of medieval Europe. Finally, having noted that their dissemination followed established networks of travel and communication, it emphasises that relics rendered the essentials of Christianity tangible and portable. (shrink)

This excellent treatment of Hegel’s political philosophy sympathetically relates Hegel’s theory of the state to contemporary debates in political science. Smith has reworked material from previous studies to accomplish two difficult tasks gracefully. First, he introduces Hegel’s political philosophy to intelligent readers who are assumed to be unfamiliar with Hegel. This requires extended treatments of the philosophical context of Hegel’s views and of Hegel’s intellectual development. Second, he derives specific political views from Hegel and brings them to bear on current (...) issues in political science. (shrink)

This ambitious biography weaves a huge quantity of information into a rich and suggestive account of Hegel’s life and thought. Within the genre of trade biography, Terry Pinkard tells a readable story of Hegel’s personal life, discusses the genesis and content of his major writings, analyzes his leading ideas, and evaluates his significance for intellectual history. Accomplishing all this within Pinkard’s own lifetime has required compromises - notably the neglect of the voluminous literature and the reliance on existing compilations and (...) scholarship. (shrink)

This ambitious biography weaves a huge quantity of information into a rich and suggestive account of Hegel’s life and thought. Within the genre of trade biography, Terry Pinkard tells a readable story of Hegel’s personal life, discusses the genesis and content of his major writings, analyzes his leading ideas, and evaluates his significance for intellectual history. Accomplishing all this within Pinkard’s own lifetime has required compromises - notably the neglect of the voluminous literature and the reliance on existing compilations and (...) scholarship. (shrink)

This ambitious biography weaves a huge quantity of information into a rich and suggestive account of Hegel’s life and thought. Within the genre of trade biography, Terry Pinkard tells a readable story of Hegel’s personal life, discusses the genesis and content of his major writings, analyzes his leading ideas, and evaluates his significance for intellectual history. Accomplishing all this within Pinkard’s own lifetime has required compromises - notably the neglect of the voluminous literature and the reliance on existing compilations and (...) scholarship. (shrink)

It is hard to imagine a revival of Schelling’s philosophy of medicine. But in the past decade, there have been seventy-five articles in American law reviews about Hegel’s philosophy of law. A comparable number of academic articles and books have also appeared. Richard Dien Winfield, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Georgia, ranks among the most ambitious and comprehensive scholars to apply Hegel to law. His latest book, Law in Civil Society, is a welcome companion to his other Hegelian (...) studies of justice and law. He himself sees the book as the completion of his systematic treatment of civil society, begun in The Just Economy, but its concerns are, perhaps, still more closely related to his Reason and Justice and Freedom and Modernity. (shrink)