When Theory Meets the World: Kant’s Post‐Revolutionary Renegotiation of the Cosmopolitan Ideal

摘要

In response to the ongoing critical interest in Kant’s idea of “cosmopolitan right” and the increasing post‐structuralist interest in the rhetoric of his political writings, this essay analyzes the rhetorical strategy of analogy Kant employs in “Toward Perpetual Peace” to figure forth the transcendental idea of perpetual peace, reason’s end with no empirical referent yet, as a cosmopolitan right in accord with the material and empirical conditions of nature and politics. The formal analogy between reason and nature, between morals and politics, this paper argues, demonstrates the resemblance between idea and experience in mere form, thus concealing the workings of aesthetic reflective judgment in bringing idea and experience to an identity. Thus, Kantian analogy maintains a critical difference between the transcendental and the empirical, preventing reason from “colonizing” its other and suggesting instead its receptiveness to the alterity of material forms. Elaborating further on the historical necessity of Kantian analogy, especially in the context of the French Revolution and empire‐building, this essay locates “Toward Perpetual Peace” on the cusp of the Enlightenment and Romanticism, where thinkers like Kant recognized an irrecoverable gap between the cosmopolitan ideal and the post‐Revolutionary conditions only to project their reconciliation into an indeterminable future.View full textDownload full textRelated var addthis_config = { ui_cobrand: "Taylor & Francis Online", services_compact: "citeulike,netvibes,twitter,technorati,delicious,linkedin,facebook,stumbleupon,digg,google,more", pubid: "ra-4dff56cd6bb1830b" }; Add to shortlist Link Permalink http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10509585.2010.514484