PHIL2634 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Rational Basis Review, Montesquieu
Document Summary
Hegel wants to deal with the philosophic science of the state not its origins in patriarchal conditions, its basis in divine right or contract Which is concerned only eith the thought of their concept. Rousseau alludes the will as the principle of the state- explain its form and its content. Regards the universal will not as the absolutely rational element in the will but only as a general will which proceeds out of this individual will as out of a conscious will. He reduces the union of individuals in the state to a contract and something based on their arbitrary wills, their opinion-abstract conclusion-constitution of a state based on thought alone-alleged rational basis but only using abstractions. Following rousseau, hegel conceives of the political sphere as the public realm where legislation is framed and executed in accordance with a shared conception of the society"s collective good. The basis of the state is the power of reason actualising itself as will.
