![]() Cover of the first edition | |
Author | Herbert Marcuse |
---|---|
Original title | Hegels Ontologie und die Grundlegung einer Theorie der Geschichtlichkeit |
Translator | Seyla Benhabib |
Country | Germany |
Language | German |
Series | Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought |
Subjects | Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel Historicity Ontology |
Publisher | Vittorio Klostermann Verlag, MIT Press |
Publication date | 1932 |
Published in English | 1987 |
Media type | Print (Hardcover and Paperback) |
Pages | 360 (1987 MIT Press edition) |
ISBN | 0-262-63125-3 (MIT Press edition) |
Hegel's Ontology and the Theory of Historicity (German : Hegels Ontologie und die Grundlegung einer Theorie der Geschichtlichkeit) is a 1932 book about the philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and his theory of historicity by the philosopher Herbert Marcuse. It is influenced by the philosopher Martin Heidegger.
The book received positive reviews upon its publication in English translation in 1987. It is considered essential for understanding Marcuse's later intellectual development. However, the book has been criticized for Marcuse's failure to define the term "historicity".
Marcuse attempts to reinterpret the works of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, including The Phenomenology of Spirit (1807) and the Science of Logic (1812), and "to disclose and to ascertain the fundamental characteristics of historicity", the factors that "define history" and distinguish it from other phenomena such as nature. He also discuses other works of Hegel such as The Difference Between Fichte's and Schelling's Systems of Philosophy (1801), the Philosophy of Nature portion of the Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences (1817), Lectures on the Philosophy of History (1837), and Lectures on the History of Philosophy . Other topics considered include Hegel's relationship to philosophers such as Aristotle, Immanuel Kant, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, and Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, and the work of the philosopher Wilhelm Dilthey. Marcuse acknowledges the influence of Martin Heidegger on his work. [1]
According to the philosopher Seyla Benhabib, Hegel's Ontology and the Theory of Historicity was originally intended to be Marcuse's Habilitationsschrift, which would have earned him the right to teach in German universities. She writes that some accounts claim that the work was rejected as a Habilitationsschrift, while others suggest that it may never have been submitted, due to Marcuse realizing that he would never be permitted to teach in Nazi Germany. The work was first published in German in 1932 under the title Hegels Ontologie und die Grundlegung einer Theorie der Geschichtlichkeit. In 1968, an unrevised version was published in German under the title Hegels Ontologie und die Theorie der Geschichtlichkeit. An Italian translation was published in 1969 by La Nuova Italia, a Spanish translation by Manuel Sacristán was published in 1970 by Ediciones Martínez Roca de Barcelona, and a French translation was published in 1972 by Les Éditions de Minuit. In 1987, the book appeared for the first time in English, in a translation by Benhabib published by MIT Press as part of the series Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought. [2] [3]
Hegel's Ontology and the Theory of Historicity received a mixed review from the philosopher Theodor W. Adorno in the Zeitschrift für Sozialforschung. [4] The book's English translation received positive reviews from Brent Nelson in Library Journal , [5] the sociologist George E. McCarthy in Contemporary Sociology , [6] and H. N. Tuttle in Choice. [7] The translation also received a mixed review from K. R. Dove in The Philosophical Review , [8] and was discussed by Adam Sitze in Theory and Event. [9]
According to Benhabib, Adorno noted that the work advanced an interpretation of historicity that departed from Heidegger's views, moving from the "meaning of Being" toward the disclosure of beings, from fundamental ontology toward the philosophy of history, and from historicity toward history. In Adorno's view, this made the work both significant and vulnerable to criticism. He noted that Marcuse did not ask if the question of the "material constitution of historicity" is compatible with an ontological investigation or whether it must lead to a materialist theory of society and history. [4]
Nelson wrote that the book "shows little of the Marcuse who became a popular New Left theorist" but would nevertheless "be of interest to students of 19th- and 20th-century philosophy." He noted that the work, "highly technical in its vocabulary", had a helpful glossary. [5] McCarthy wrote that the book was "one of those rare jewels which has remained hidden from the English-speaking world for over fifty years" and "an extremely important work for understanding the foundations of Marcuse's own intellectual perspective and his later theoretical developments". In his view, it "recaptures the heart of Hegel's philosophical vision of reality, indirectly shows its importance for social theory, and breathes life into the most difficult of Hegel's writings." [6] Tuttle described the book as "Marcuse's most important and certainly his most fundamental work" and "a philosophical classic", and recommended it "without qualification to advanced undergraduates and graduate students." He considered it less ideological than Marcuse's later writings, but essential for understanding Marcuse's Eros and Civilization (1955) and One-Dimensional Man (1964). [7]
Dove described the book as an important part of the Hegel scholarship produced between World War I and World War II, comparing it to the work of the philosophers Richard Kroner and Nicolai Hartmann. He noted that the philosopher Allan Bloom considered the book a serious work of Hegel scholarship, referring to it, although not by name, in The Closing of the American Mind (1987). Dove praised Marcuse's interpretation of the Science of Logic, but considered his interpretation of The Phenomenology of Spirit less successful, noting that his later work shows his awareness of its shortcomings. He also criticized the "tortuous Germanic style" of the book, as well as its failure to define the term "historicity". [8] Sitze argued that the book was part of a "dispute with Martin Heidegger" and "revolves around an antithesis to life that is neither death nor unlivability, but paralysis." [9]
Benhabib commented in her introduction to the work that it was the culmination of a period of Marcuse's intellectual development in which he espoused views that have been referred to as "Heideggerian Marxism", "phenomenological Marxism", or "existential Marxism". She maintained that it is crucial for understanding Marcuse's relationship to Heidegger, for "illuminating his highly original and creative reading of Hegel", and for assessing his Hegelian form of critical Marxism. She credited Marcuse with providing "detailed and careful commentary on Hegel's Logic and Phenomenology of Spirit", but noted that the work might have an "initially daunting character for the contemporary reader." She attributed its neglect in the literature on Marcuse and critical theory to the fact that it does not refer explicitly to Karl Marx and historical materialism, and argued that Marcuse, influenced by both Dilthey and Heidegger, did not succeed in the resolving the tensions between their approaches. She suggested that Marcuse might have been attempting to respond to a criticism of Hegel made by Heidegger in Being and Time (1927), according to which Hegel's phrase that "Spirit falls into time" obscures the fact that Spirit is already in time. She noted that Hegel's Ontology and the Theory of Historicity has "met with some skepticism" as an interpretation of Hegel, and that the centrality of the term "historicity" to Hegel's concerns has been questioned. Though defending its relevance to Hegel, she maintained that Marcuse's failure to define it "adds to the obliqueness if not the obscurity of some of his intentions." [10]
She praised other parts of the work, calling his discussion of the dialectic of work and recognition "brilliant". Though pointing to similarities between Marcuse's views and Heidegger's, she noted that there were also differences, and that a "Heideggerian objection" to the work would be "that it contains no clear distinction between the "world-historical" dimension and the "historicity" proper to Dasein. She suggested that Heidegger might have rejected it as a Habilitationsschrift had the opportunity to do so arisen. She disputed Robert B. Pippin's view that the work provides the basis for many elements of a full critical theory, but also rejected Jean-Michel Palmier's view that it was made obsolete by Marcuse's subsequent study on Hegel, Reason and Revolution (1941). She criticized Marcuse for the style of his work in the original German, and for failing to properly describe the role of narrativity in human existence, but argued that Eros and Civilization (1955) continues his interest in historicity and helped make up for the deficiencies of his earlier work. [11]
Russell Rockwell considered Hegel's Ontology and the Theory of Historicity a major work on Hegel, and noted that it presented a more thorough investigation of the social relevance of Hegel's absolute idea than did Marcuse's subsequent work Reason and Revolution (1941), the discussion in the latter work being an abbreviated version of that in the former. [12]
German philosophy, meaning philosophy in the German language or philosophy by German people, in its diversity, is fundamental for both the analytic and continental traditions. It covers figures such as Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Immanuel Kant, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Ludwig Wittgenstein, the Vienna Circle, and the Frankfurt School, who now count among the most famous and studied philosophers of all time. They are central to major philosophical movements such as rationalism, German idealism, Romanticism, dialectical materialism, existentialism, phenomenology, hermeneutics, logical positivism, and critical theory. The Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard is often also included in surveys of German philosophy due to his extensive engagement with German thinkers.
The Frankfurt School is a school of thought in sociology and critical philosophy. It is associated with the Institute for Social Research founded at Goethe University Frankfurt in 1923. Formed during the Weimar Republic during the European interwar period, the first generation of the Frankfurt School was composed of intellectuals, academics, and political dissidents dissatisfied with the contemporary socio-economic systems of the 1930s; namely, capitalism, fascism, and communism.
Continental philosophy is a term used to describe some philosophers and philosophical traditions that do not fall under the umbrella of analytic philosophy. However, there is no academic consensus on the definition of continental philosophy. Prior to the twentieth century, the term "continental" was used broadly to refer to philosophy from continental Europe. A different use of the term originated among English-speaking philosophers in the second half of the 20th century, who used it to refer to a range of thinkers and traditions outside the analytic movement. Continental philosophy includes German idealism, phenomenology, existentialism, hermeneutics, structuralism, post-structuralism, deconstruction, French feminism, psychoanalytic theory, and the critical theory of the Frankfurt School as well as branches of Freudian, Hegelian and Western Marxist views. There is widespread influence and debate between the analytic and continental traditions; some philosophers see the differences between the two traditions as being based on institutions, relationships, and ideology rather than anything of significant philosophical substance.
Being and Time is the 1927 magnum opus of German philosopher Martin Heidegger and a key document of existentialism. Being and Time is among the most influential texts of 20th century philosophy. It had a notable impact on subsequent philosophy, literary theory and many other fields. Though controversial, its stature in intellectual history has been compared with works by Kant and Hegel. The book attempts to revive ontology through an analysis of Dasein, or "being-in-the-world." It is also noted for an array of neologisms and complex language, as well as an extended treatment of "authenticity" as a means to grasp and confront the unique and finite possibilities of the individual.
Raya Dunayevskaya, later Rae Spiegel, also known by the pseudonym Freddie Forest, was the American founder of the philosophy of Marxist humanism in the United States. At one time Leon Trotsky's secretary, she later split with him and ultimately founded the organization News and Letters Committees and was its leader until her death.
Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud is a book by the German philosopher and social critic Herbert Marcuse, in which the author proposes a non-repressive society, attempts a synthesis of the theories of Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud, and explores the potential of collective memory to be a source of disobedience and revolt and point the way to an alternative future. Its title alludes to Freud's Civilization and Its Discontents (1930). The 1966 edition has an added "political preface".
Seyla Benhabib is a Turkish-born American philosopher. Benhabib is a senior research scholar and adjunct professor of law at Columbia Law School. She is also an affiliate faculty member in the Columbia University Department of Philosophy and a senior fellow at the Columbia Center for Contemporary Critical Thought. She was a scholar in residence at the Law School from 2018 to 2019 and was also the James S. Carpentier Visiting professor of law in spring 2019. She was the Eugene Mayer Professor of Political Science and Philosophy at Yale University from 2001 to 2020. She was director of the program in Ethics, Politics, and Economics from 2002 to 2008. Benhabib is well known for her work in political philosophy, which draws on critical theory and feminist political theory. She has written extensively on the philosophers Hannah Arendt and Jürgen Habermas, as well as on the topic of human migration. She is the author of numerous books, and has received several prestigious awards and lectureships in recognition of her work.
The Praxis school was a Marxist humanist philosophical circle, whose members were influenced by Western Marxism. It originated in Zagreb in the SFR Yugoslavia, during the 1960s.
Reason and Revolution: Hegel and the Rise of Social Theory is a book by the philosopher Herbert Marcuse, in which the author discusses the social theories of the philosophers Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and Karl Marx. Marcuse reinterprets Hegel, with the aim of demonstrating that Hegel's basic concepts are hostile to the tendencies that led to fascism.
Robert Buford Pippin is an American philosopher. He is the Evelyn Stefansson Nef Distinguished Service Professor in the John U. Nef Committee on Social Thought, the Department of Philosophy, and the college at the University of Chicago.
Irrational Man: A Study in Existential Philosophy is a 1958 book by the philosopher William Barrett, in which the author explains the philosophical background of existentialism and provides a discussion of several major existentialist thinkers, including Søren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, and Jean-Paul Sartre. Irrational Man helped to introduce existentialism to the English-speaking world and has been identified as one of the most useful books that discuss the subject, but Barrett has also been criticized for endorsing irrationality and for giving a distorted and misleading account of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.
Nietzsche and Philosophy is a 1962 book about Friedrich Nietzsche by the philosopher Gilles Deleuze, in which the author treats Nietzsche as a systematically coherent philosopher, discussing concepts such as the will to power and the eternal return. Nietzsche and Philosophy is a celebrated and influential work. Its publication has been seen as a significant turning-point in French philosophy, which had previously given little consideration to Nietzsche as a serious philosopher.
Marxism and Freedom: from 1776 Until Today is a 1958 book by the philosopher and activist Raya Dunayevskaya, the first volume of her 'Trilogy of Revolution'.
Knowledge and Human Interests is a 1968 book by the German philosopher Jürgen Habermas, in which the author discusses the development of the modern natural and human sciences. He criticizes Sigmund Freud, arguing that psychoanalysis is a branch of the humanities rather than a science, and provides a critique of the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.
Main Currents of Marxism: Its Origins, Growth and Dissolution is a work about Marxism by the political philosopher Leszek Kołakowski. Its three volumes in English are The Founders, The Golden Age, and The Breakdown. It was first published in Polish in Paris in 1976, with the English translation appearing in 1978. In 2005, Main Currents of Marxism was republished in a one volume edition, with a new preface and epilogue by Kołakowski. The work was intended to be a "handbook" on Marxism by Kołakowski, who was once an orthodox Marxist but ultimately rejected Marxism. Despite his critical stand toward Marxism, Kołakowski endorsed the philosopher György Lukács's interpretation of the philosopher Karl Marx.
The Logical Investigations is a two-volume work by the philosopher Edmund Husserl, in which the author discusses the philosophy of logic and criticizes psychologism, the view that logic is based on psychology.
In Marxist philosophy, reification is the process by which human social relations are perceived as inherent attributes of the people involved in them, or attributes of some product of the relation, such as a traded commodity.
The correct place of Karl Marx's early writings within his system as a whole has been a matter of great controversy. Some believe there is a break in Marx's development that divides his thought into two periods: the "Young Marx" is said to be a thinker who deals with the problem of alienation, while the "Mature Marx" is said to aspire to a scientific socialism.
Herbert Marcuse was a German-American philosopher, social critic, and political theorist, associated with the Frankfurt School of critical theory. Born in Berlin, Marcuse studied at the Humboldt University of Berlin and then at Freiburg, where he received his PhD. He was a prominent figure in the Frankfurt-based Institute for Social Research – what later became known as the Frankfurt School. In his written works, he criticized capitalism, modern technology, Soviet Communism, and popular culture, arguing that they represent new forms of social control.
Soviet Marxism: A Critical Analysis is a 1958 book by the philosopher Herbert Marcuse, in which the author provides a critique of the Ideology of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. It received positive reviews, describing it as a convincing discussion of its subject.