Freedom and Perfection

Douglas Moggach is Distinguished University Professor in Political Studies and Philosophy at the University of Ottawa, and Honorary Professor, School of Philosophical and Historical Inquiry at the University of Sydney. Publications, in nine languages, include Philosophy and Politics of Bruno Bauer (Cambridge, 2003); The New Hegelians (Cambridge, 2006); Politics, Religion, and Art (2011); and (as co-editor), The 1848 Revolutions and European Political Thought (Cambridge, 2018).

• 1. Thinking freedom; 2. Leibniz: spontaneity, justice, and perfection; 3. Receptions of Leibniz: Wolff and Herder; 4. The Kantian revolution; 5. Foundational arguments: Humboldt and Dalberg on the scope and end of the state; 6. Friedrich Schiller: perfection, freedom, and beauty; 7. Fichte: the labour of spontaneity; 8. Hegel as post-Kantian perfectionist; 9. Hegelian perfectionism before 1848; 10. Karl Marx: historical perfectionism; Conclusion; Select bibliography; Index.

'Kant transformed political philosophy by making freedom rather than happiness the 'essential end' of humankind, and Fichte, Hegel, and Marx rang variations on this theme.  True enough, but so did Schiller and von Humboldt, and it all began with Leibniz, whom Kant adapted as well as criticized, and who remained the source of so much in German philosophy.  Douglas Moggach tells this important story with verve as well as accuracy!' Paul Guyer, Brown University