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Giovanni Gentile and the State of Contemporary Constructivism

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Giovanni Gentile and the State of Contemporary Constructivism View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Online Research @ Cardiff Cardiff School of European Languages, Translation and Politics Cardiff University Giovanni Gentile and the State of Contemporary Constructivism A thesis submitted on 2nd July 2013 in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of PhD in Political Theory 79,693 words, excluding title and contents pages, footnotes, bibliography and appendices Candidate: James Wakefield Supervisors: Prof. Bruce Haddock Dr Peri Roberts Contents Part/Chapter Title Page 0 Introductory matter i Declarations v Acknowledgements vi Summary vii 0.1 Introduction 1 Sub-heading 1 Overview of aims 1 2 On scope and originality 2 2i The death of the author 3 2ii Gentile criticism since his assassination 6 3 A new approach to Gentile 11 4 On constructivism 15 4i Simple constructivism 17 4ii Procedural constructivism 19 5 Structure and overview 21 1 Components of actual idealism 23 1.1 The pure act of construction 25 1 On method 25 2 Toward pensiero pensante, or ‘the thought that thinks itself’ 31 2i The Cogito Justification 34 2ii The Logical Priority Justification 37 3 The abstract/concrete division 39 4 Truth in the method of immanence 43 4i The will and truth 44 4ii The Gentilean will: being and Being There 47 4iii The value of truth and its construction 51 5 Coherence and construction 54 6 Actual idealism’s positivity and the unknown 61 7 Conclusion 67 1.2 The priority of the socius 69 1 Actual idealism and the person 70 1i The Solipsist Objection 71 i Introductory matter 1ii The Conditionality Objection 74 1iii Persons and personalism 76 2 Socialising the pure act 78 2i The internal society and the conscience 81 2ii The internal dialogue 84 3 Constructing the universal will 86 3i Internality and indeterminacy 89 3ii A schematic for the socius 92 4 Politicising the internal society 94 4i Internal and external dialogues 95 4ii The state and the universal will 97 5 Conclusion 101 1.3 The total ethical state 103 1 Gentile on the state in Diritto and Introduzione 104 2 Gentile on Hegel’s ethical state 108 3 Gentile’s mature state 117 4 ‘The real shipwreck of actualism’: some standard objections 123 5 The ethical state of mind 130 6 Conclusion 132 2 Gentilean constructivism in moral theory 135 2.1 Gentile contra Kant on practical reason 137 1 Reason in actual idealism 138 1i The internal dialogue re-visited 142 1ii Universality and objectivity 145 1iii The heart of reason 148 1iv The IDP in outline 151 2 Kant’s categorical imperative 153 3 The Universal Law Formula 156 3i O’Neill on universality 160 3ii A Gentilean reply to O’Neill and Kant 164 4 The Kingdom of Ends Formula 166 5 The Autonomy Formula 169 5i Kant on autonomy 170 5ii Korsgaard’s account of Kantian autonomy 172 ii Introductory matter 5iii Gentile on autonomy (and autarchy) 175 6 Re-constructing Gentilean moral theory 180 7 Conclusion 183 2.2 The construction of value in Gentilean education 185 1 Autonomy, indeterminacy and ‘determined subjectivity’ 186 2 Gentile’s phenomenology of education 190 3 Education and the state 195 4 Three objections to Gentilean education 202 4i The Falsity Objection 204 4ii The Manipulation Objection 208 4iii The Coercion Objection 211 5 Replies to the Objections 214 6 Re-appraising Gentilean education 219 6i Gentilean education and political theory 219 6ii Gentilean education and the IDP 223 7 Conclusion 225 2.3 Dialogical constructivism and the idea of agreement 227 1 Justifying dialogue 228 2 Internalism and the real world 235 2i Triangulation and objectivity 237 2ii Two principles for the IDP 240 3 Agreement and the IDP 243 3i Hypothetical agreements and constructivism 246 3ii Verification and the IDP 249 3iii Falsification and the IDP 253 4 Inter-personal applications of the IDP 255 4i ‘Stacking’ and objectivity 255 4ii Persons and principles 261 6 Conclusion 269 3 Giovanni Gentile and the state of contemporary constructivism 271 3.1 Conclusion 273 1 Overview of conclusions 274 2 Actual idealism assessed 279 3 Constructivism writ large 282 iii Introductory matter 4 Final remarks 286 3.2 Bibliography and appendices 289 1 List of works cited 289 1i Works by Giovanni Gentile 289 1ii Works by other authors 290 1iii Useful further reading not directly cited 298 2 Appendix: abbreviations for Gentile’s works 300 3 Bibliographic acknowledgements 301 List of diagrams Number Title Page 1 Non-constructed moral authority 144 2 Minimal dialogical construction 146 3 The IDP in outline 152 4 ‘Stacking’ IDPs 258 iv Introductory matter Declarations Statement 1 This work has not been submitted in substance for any other degree or award at this or any other university or place of learning, nor is being submitted concurrently in candidature for any degree or other award. Signed ____________________________ (candidate) Date: 02/07/2013 Statement 2 This thesis is being submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of PhD. Signed ____________________________ (candidate) Date: 02/07/2013 Statement 3 This thesis is the result of my own independent work/investigation, except where otherwise stated. Other sources are acknowledged by explicit references. The views expressed are my own. Signed ____________________________ (candidate) Date: 02/07/2013 Statement 4 I hereby give consent for my thesis, if accepted, to be available for photocopying and for inter-library loan, and for the title and summary to be made available to outside organisations. Signed ____________________________ (candidate) Date: 02/07/2013 v Introductory matter Statement 5 I hereby give consent for my thesis, if accepted, to be available for photocopying and for inter-library loans after expiry of a bar on access previously approved by the Academic Standards & Quality Committee. Signed ____________________________ (candidate) Date: 02/07/2013 Acknowledgements I am conscious of how lucky I am to have been able to undertake this research project and to spend several years reading, writing and thinking about challenging ideas. To the many people who supported me on that long road I am grateful. For brevity’s sake I will thank just a few in particular: Bruce Haddock, for his unwavering enthusiasm, valuable advice and genuine liberalism; Peri Roberts, for his useful suggestions, administered always with surgical precision, which helped me root out a constructivism that was Gentilean rather than Gentile’s; the Arts and Humanities Research Council, which kept me fed and watered, suited and booted throughout; and my parents, who, whether or not they remember, actually suggested all of this in the first place. To those others who listened to, read, or commented upon my ideas as they grew into the thesis: I thank you all for your advice and your patience. vi Introductory matter Summary This thesis presents Giovanni Gentile’s actual idealism as a radical constructivist doctrine for use in moral theory. The first half describes the moral theory that Gentile explicitly identifies with actual idealism, according to which all thinking, rather than an exclusive domain of ‘practical reason,’ has a moral character. It is argued that after Gentile’s turn to Fascism in the early 1920s, this theory is increasingly conflated with his political doctrine. This entails several major changes that cannot be squared with the underlying metaphysics. The second half of the thesis develops a more plausible account of Gentilean moral constructivism based on the pre-Fascist idea of reasoning as an internal dialogue. Comparisons and contrasts are drawn with contemporary constructivist doctrines, as well as theories employing dialogical conceptions of reason. The internal dialogue is presented as a device enabling the thinking subject to make objective judgements about real-world problems despite the impossibility of her occupying a fully objective standpoint. Thus actual idealist moral theory is offered as an example of constructivism at its most radical, inviting advocates of less radical varieties to re-assess the foundations on which their theories are built. vii Introductory matter viii 0.1 Introduction 1. Overview of aims This thesis describes and develops the moral theory of Giovanni Gentile (1875- 1944), the Sicilian philosopher most often remembered for his contributions to the Italian Fascist regime, first as Minister of Public Instruction, later as a Senator and head of the Institute of Fascist Culture, and in general as one of the Party’s most vocal and erudite spokesmen. Despite Gentile’s colourful biography and the various controversies with which his political career links him, I have little to say about his life or the history and ideology of Fascism. Those I leave for historians to interpret. My interests are narrowly philosophical. I argue that Gentile’s ‘actual idealism’ is an unusually ambitious constructivist doctrine, comprising sophisticated conceptions of the person and society, truth and reason, and the way all of these are joined in moral enterprise. His constructivism is different from those described by Kant or any other post-Kantian philosopher, and grounded on metaphysical foundations that, beneath recondite technical vocabulary, are both familiar and credible. I argue that this moral theory is worthy of rehabilitation even if the political theory extending from it is not. To show this I must separate Gentile’s ethics from his work (and, more pressingly, his enduring reputation) as ‘the philosopher of Fascism.’ There is a healthy flow of work on that topic already. A systematic treatment of actual idealism’s implications for contemporary moral constructivism is noticeably absent from the secondary literature. In correcting this paucity I mean to present a Gentilean theory that shares its major aims with the better-known versions of constructivism in recent Anglo-American philosophy, though reaching them by a distinctively different route.
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