Compare and contrast Burke and Hegel on the French Revolution and its political implications.

This is an exegetical essay. Exegesis is the careful reading and interpretation of texts. Thus, it is worthwhile digging into each of the relevant texts in depth and putting the thinkers in close dialogue vis-à-vis the essay question: . You should only use the readings I specify for this essay. No secondary texts or sources are to be used.

Please use embedded or parenthetical citations in the essay. For example, when citing Burke’s Reflections on the Revolution in France, do as follows: (Burke, R, pg#). It is crucial that you provide specific page numbers in your embedded citations. Essays should include an MLA-style bibliography at the end of the document. It should be easy to look up the in-text citations from the bibliography.

For Burke: only use his work titled: “Reflections on the Revolution in France” as a source.

For Hegel: only use “Hegel,” Preface, “Introduction” (Par. 1-5, 11-25, 26-33), and “Abstract Right” (Par.34-72, 82, 99) in his work titled: “Philosophy of Right”

Also for Hegel, use the 2 other readings that have been uploaded (Hegel, “Dialectic of Lordship and Bondage” and “Absolute Freedom and Terror”). Please cite Hegel by Paragraph number in the essay.

3 readings for Hegel, 1 for Burke.

Some important things to note for Hegel:

The Lessons of the Dialectic of Lordship and Bondage

Freedom has to be recognized in the world for it to become objective (rather than merely a figment of one’s imagination), and this requires putting one’s life on the line.

Labor has an important transformative dimension in that it enables individuals to transform nature into the objects of their wills (as opposed to being dictated by instinct and desire). Labor also teaches the bondman that ‘he exists in his own right’.

Domination is shown to result in a perpetual state of dependency that is self-defeating. Recognition has to be mutual and symmetrical.

The long epochal struggle against domination is expressed most powerful by the Enlightenment’s struggle against superstition and hierarchy, which culminates with the French Revolution.

From Absolute Freedom to the Reign of Terror

Paragraph 582. “This withdrawal from the form of objectivity of the Useful [Utility] has, however, already taken place in principle and from this inner revolution there emerges the actual revolution of the actual world, the new shape of consciousness, absolute freedom.”

Absolute Freedom & the Generality of the Reasonable Will

584. “Spirit thus comes before us as absolute freedom. It is conscious of its pure personality and therein of all spiritual reality and all reality is solely spiritual; the world is for it simply its own will, and this is a general will [prof’s emphasis]. And what is more, this will is not the empty thought of will which consists in silent assent, or assent by a representative, but a real general will, the will of all individuals as such.”

The Quest to Abolish Arbitrary Differences

585. “In this absolute freedom, therefore, all social groups or classes which are spiritual spheres into which the whole is articulated are abolished; the individual consciousness that belonged to any such sphere, and willed and fulfilled itself it, has put aside its limitation; its purpose is the general purpose, its language universal law, its work the universal work.”

The Latent Contradiction between Universal and Particular

589. “Before the universal can perform a deed it must concentrate itself into the One of individuality and put at the head an individual self-consciousness; for the universal will is only an actual will in a self, which is a One. But thereby all other individuals are excluded from the entirety of this deed and have only limited share in it, so that the deed would not be a deed of the actual universal self-consciousness. Universal freedom, therefore, can produce neither a positive work nor a deed; there is left for it only negative action; it is merely the fury of destruction.”

Terror and Death as the Logical Outcomes of Absolute Freedom

590. “Now that it has completed the destruction of the actual organization of the world, and exists now just for itself, this is the sole object, an object that no longer has any content, possession, existence, or outer extension, but is merely this knowledge of itself an absolutely pure and free individual self. All that remains of the object by which it can be laid hold off is solely its abstract existence as such”.

591. “The sole work and deed of universal freedom is therefore death, a death too which has no inner significance or filling, for what is negated is the empty point of the absolutely free self. It is thus the coldest and meanest of all deaths, with no more significance than cutting off a head of a cabbage or swallowing a mouthful of water.”

Stuck in Negativity

590. “What is called government is merely the victorious faction, and in the very fact of its being a faction lies the direct necessity of its overthrow; and its being government makes it conversion into a faction, and (so) guilty.”

A Dialectical Reversal?

Para 592. “It is such that it is objective to itself; the terror of death is the vision of this negative nature of itself. But absolute free self-consciousness finds this its reality quite different from what its own Notion of itself was…”

Retrieving Particularity

Para 593. “…and in so far as this Substance has shown itself to be the negative element for the individual consciousness, the organization of spiritual ‘masses’ or spheres to which the plurality of individual consciousnesses are assigned thus takes shape once more. These individuals who have felt the fear of death, of their absolute master, again submit to negation and distinctions, arrange themselves in the various spheres, and return to an apportioned and limited task but thereby to their substantial reality.”

– •This paragraph (593) shows the Lesson of the reign of terror, which is that we need to have distinction between rulers and ruled. Cannot have direct unmediated democracy because this results in terror, where stronger faction will win and try to destroy everyone else. This is a fundamental lesson of the French revolution and particularly in discussion of absolute freedom and terror according to Hegel

The Lessons of the French Revolution

-Hegel criticizes the French Revolution for failing to deliver on its own promise of equal autonomy for all individuals. However, unlike Burke, he does not reject it as a radical break with organic nature. • Because nature is not the standard for Hegel, it’s reason and ultimately, spirit/Geist.

-The preservation of particularity, including the institutional mediation between rulers and ruled, is shown to be indispensable to the actual realization of individual freedom. •You need to have particular mediation •You need to have a distinction between rulers and ruled in order for freedom to be realized and individuals to feel at home in the modern world. Otherwise, this would lead to terror. From para 593.

-This institutional form of mediation is predicated upon the modern rational state that becomes the central topic of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right

Some important things to note for Burke:

Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen (1789)

Helpful to try to grapple with Burke’s problems and why he was worried with abstract natural rights and the way they manifested themselves in the French Revolution. Burke had a problem with abstract rights the French fought for.

Burke was not fond of the French Revolution but thought the American Revolution was better.

Burke on Abstract Rights

“They [the French] despise experience as the wisdom of unlettered men; and as for the rest, they have wrought underground a mine that will blow up, at one grand explosion, all examples of antiquity, all precedents, charters, and acts of parliament. They have “rights of men”. Against these there can be no prescription, against these no agreement is binding; these admit no temperament and no compromise; anything withheld from their full demand is so much of fraud and injustice.” p 58 Oxford edition.

There is contempt according to burke.

Burke on Concretely Entailed/Inherited Rights

“In denying their false claims of right [natural rights], I do not mean to injure those which are real and are such as their pretended rights would totally destroy. If civil society be made for the advantage of man, all the advantages for which it is made become his right. It is an institution of beneficence; and law itself is only beneficence acting by a rule. Men have a right to live by that rule; they have a right to do justice, as between their fellows, whether their fellows are in public function or in ordinary occupation. They have a right to the fruits of their industry and to the means of making their industry fruitful. They have a right to the acquisitions of their parents, to the nourishment and improvement of their offspring, to instruction in life, and to consolation in death. Whatever each man can separately do, without trespassing upon others, he has a right to do for himself; and he has a right to a fair portion of all which society, with all its combinations of skill and force, can do in his favor. In this partnership all men have equal rights, but not to equal things.” p. 59 Oxford Edition.

There is certainly a lot more but these are some important things I think. Please try to include some of it in the essay. Including further exegesis will be important as well.