Realism and Utopianism in Hegel's Political Thought

Working Paper Series Papers available in the Working Paper Series are works in progress. Please do not cite without permission. Any comments should be addressed directly to the author Reference WP006 Title Realism and Utopianism in Hegel’s Political Thought: National Sovereignty, International Relations and the Idea of a ‘World State’ Author Tony Burns Email: [email protected] Tony Burns Centre for the Study of Social and Global Justice School of Politics & International Relations University of Nottingham Realism and Utopianism in Hegel’s Political Thought: National Sovereignty, International Relations and the Idea of a ‘World State’ Introduction W. Warren Wagar, in a work devoted to H. G. Wells’s views on the idea of a ‘world state,’ has claimed that ‘Wells always considered Hegel a humbug, and Hegelianism a past-time for wool gathering dons.’1 This suggests that Wells’s attitude towards the philosophy of Hegel is one of contemptuous dismissal. The implication is that Wells owed very little to Hegel as a source for his own philosophical beliefs. At least he claimed not to do so. It is not clear to me, however, how seriously this claim is to be taken. After all, the title of one of Wells’s works is Science and the World Mind (1942) and Wells did undertake what might be considered to be essentially an ‘Hegelian’ project, the writing of a brief excursus into world history.’ With the title A Short History of the World (1922). Moreover, there is a distinct ‘Hegelian’ tone to what Wells says about the emerging ‘world state’ in his (1902) Anticipations.2 And there is also the way in which Wells’s employs the philosophical categories of ‘universal’ and ‘particular’ in his A Modern Utopia.3 If it were carried out comprehensively this would be a major project, as there are a number of issues which would need to be discussed. In order to make things more manageable I shall focus on Hegel’s views on world history, and the idea of the ‘end of history.’ This discussion will lead to an examination of the idea of a ‘world state,’ the precursor to that of H. G. Wells, an interest in which, as in the case of the idea of ‘cosmopolitanism,’ has been the subject of a revival of late, largely as a consequence of the phenomenon of ‘globalization.’ The structure of the argument is as follows. In Section I shall discuss utopianism and realism in Hegel’s political thought, in connection with what might be referred to as ‘domestic’ or ‘national’ affairs. In Section 2 I shall do the same thing in connection with questions of international relations. Whether one is talking about national or international politics, in both cases there are arguments for and against associating Hegel with both ‘realism’ and ‘utopianism.’ Sections 1 and 2 will, therefore, be structured accordingly. In Section 3 I relate a discussion of Hegel’s views on international relations in particular to the recent debate between ‘communitarians’ and ‘cosmopolitans’ within the discipline of political theory. I suggest that this debate is connected to the parallel debate between the advocates of the ‘realist’ and ‘utopian’ readings of Hegel. I argue that one possible way of reading what Hegel has to say about international relations in the final sections of his Philosophy of Right, would be to think of him as being neither a ‘strong’ cosmopolitan thinker, that is to say, in the present context, someone who would have been sympathetic to the idea of a ‘world state,’ nor on the other hand a strong ‘communitarian’ thinker, but rather as attempting to steer a via media between these two opposed extremes. This way of thinking suggests that the ‘logic’ of Hegel’s argument in the Philosophy of Right, if it is developed in a slightly different way from the way in which Hegel himself develops it, leads to the view that some kind of higher political community might be thought of as being brought into existence at the global level by the onward march of world history. The component elements of this political community would be individual nation-states. The framework of international relations which would exist between these states might be characterized as a condition of peace rather than a Hobbesian condition of war. However the idea of such a global political community falls far short of a commitment to the idea of a ‘world state’ in the sense in which H. G. Wells uses the term, that is to say a situation in which individual nation states, and national sovereignty, have disappeared altogether. I do not think that such a reading of the final sections of the Philosophy of Right could be plausibly be presented as an interpretation of Hegel’s own views. They are, rather, an appropriation of some of them. 4 It would, however, be legitimate to claim that they are in some sense ‘Hegelian’ in spirit. Section 1 Hegel and National Politics 1.1 Hegel as a ‘Realist’ Critic of Utopianism Argument 1: The Inherent Conservatism of Hegel’s Political Thought Let us begin by considering the evidence that Hegel was a ‘realist’ who rejected all forms of political ‘utopianism’ focusing specifically on the arena if national politics. On this reading, as is indicated by the Preface to the Philosophy of Right, Hegel had nothing but contempt for ‘utopian’ theorizing, which he considered to be ‘other worldly’ and ‘unhistorical.’ He did not consider his own ideas to be ‘utopian’ at all, in any sense. As Hegel puts it: 1 • ‘This book, then, containing as it does the science of the state, is to be nothing other than the endeavour to apprehend and portray the state as something inherently rational. As a work of philosophy, it must be poles apart from an attempt to construe a state as it ought to be.’5 • ‘It is just this placing of philosophy in the actual world which meets with misunderstandings, and so I revert to what I have said before, namely that, since philosophy is the exploration of the rational, it is for that very reason the apprehension of the present and the actual, not the erection of a beyond, supposed to exist, God knows where, or rather, which exists, and we can perfectly well say where, namely in the error of a one-sided, empty, ratiocination.’6 See also the following, similar passages from Hegel’s Science of Logic: • ‘Kant regards the Idea as a necessity and as the goal which, as the archetype, it must be our endeavour to set up for a maximum and to which we must strive to bring the condition of the actual world ever nearer.’7 • ‘But having reached the result that the Idea is the unity of the Notion and objectivity, is the true, it must not be regarded merely as a goal to which we have to approximate but which itself always remains a kind of beyond; on the contrary, we must recognise that everything actual is only in so far as it possesses the Idea and expresses it. It is not merely that the object, the objective and subjective world in general, ought to be congruous with the Idea, but they are themselves the congruence of Notion and reality; the reality that does not correspond to the Notion is mere Appearance, the subjective, contingent, capricious element that is not the truth.’8 • ‘When it is said that no object is to be found in experience that is perfectly congruous with the Idea, one is opposing the Idea as a subjective standard to the actual; but what anything actual is supposed in truth to be, if its Notion is not in it and if its objectivity docs not correspond to its Notion at all, it is impossible to say; for it would be nothing.’9 • ‘But if an object, for example the state, did not correspond at all to its Idea, that is, if in fact it was not the Idea of the state at all, if its reality, which is the self-conscious individuals, did not correspond at all to the Notion, its soul and its body would have parted; the former would escape into the solitary regions of thought, the latter would have broken up into the single individualities.’10 Hegel was critical of the ‘abstract rationalism’ which is usually associated with both the (liberal) political thought of the Enlightenment and with utopianism, a style of thinking which, as is clear from the passages above, he associates with the philosophy of Kant. He associated this attitude of mind with a tendency towards ‘civil disobedience’ on the part of individuals, who often appeal to ‘conscience’ or the ‘laws of reason’ as a higher court, or higher law, than that of the laws of the society in which they live. 11 A parallel tendency towards political ‘radicalism’ and a willingness to use violence as a means for achieving political ends: especially in the case of the Jacobins in France: such an attitude led to ‘the terror’ of 1793. Hegel’s views on this subject are similar to those of Edmund Burke.12 This amounts to saying that, again like Burke (and Montesquieu) Hegel had a strong sense of history, and of the importance of historical context when discussing political affairs. He was a ‘constitutionalist’ in the historical sense which is usually associated with Burke and traditional conservatism, rather than in the liberal, individualist sense which is associated with, for example, Tom Paine, or the French Revolutionaries, or Kant.13 Hegel attaches importance to history, both at the ‘local’/’national level and at the ‘global’ level, or the level of ‘world history.’ So far as the latter is concerned, the ‘historical reason’ which Hegel associates with ‘world history’ is one which does not call for the overthrow or complete destruction of existing constitutions.

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