Political philosophy of Immanuel Kant

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Immanuel Kant

Major works

Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics

Critique of Pure Reason

"Answering the Question: What is

Enlightenment?"

Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals

Critique of Practical Reason

Critique of Judgment

Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason

Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch

The Metaphysics of Morals

Kantianism

Kantian ethics

Transcendental idealism

Critical philosophy

Sapere aude

Schema
A priori and a posteriori

Analyticsynthetic distinction

Noumenon

Categories

Categorical imperative

Hypothetical imperative

"Kingdom of Ends"

Political philosophy
People

George Berkeley

Ren Descartes

J. G. Fichte

F. H. Jacobi

G. W. F. Hegel

David Hume

Arthur Schopenhauer

Baruch Spinoza

African Spir

Johannes Tetens
Related topics

Schopenhauer's criticism

German idealism

Neo-Kantianism

The political philosophy of Immanuel Kant (17241804) favoured a classical

republican approach.[1] In Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch (1795), Kant listed
several conditions that he thought necessary for ending wars and creating a lasting
peace. They included a world of constitutional republics by establishment of political
community.[2] His classical republican theory was extended in Doctrine of Right (1797),
the first part of Metaphysics of Morals.[3] At the end of the 20th century Kant's political
philosophy had been enjoying a remarkable renaissance in English-speaking countries
with more major studies in a few years than had appeared in the preceding many
decades.[4]
Kant's most significant contribution to political philosophy and the philosophy of law is
the doctrine of Rechtsstaat. According to this doctrine, the power of the state is limited
in order to protect citizens from the arbitrary exercise of authority. The Rechtsstaat
(German: Rechtsstaat) is a concept in continental European legal thinking, originally
borrowed from German jurisprudence, which can be translated as "the Legal state" or
"state of rights". It is a "constitutional state" in which the exercise of governmental
power is constrained by the law,[5] and is often tied to the Anglo-American concept of
the rule of law. Kant's political philosophy has been described as liberal for its
presumption of limits on the state based on the social contract as a regulative matter.[6]
In a Rechtsstaat, the citizens share legally based civil liberties and they can use the
courts. A country cannot be a liberal democracy without first being a Rechtsstaat.
German writers usually place Immanuel Kant's theories at the beginning of their
accounts of the movement toward the Rechtsstaat.[7] The Rechtsstaat in the meaning of
"constitutional state" was introduced in the latest works of Immanuel Kant after US and
French constitutions were adopted in the late 18th century. Kants approach is based on
the supremacy of a countrys written constitution. This supremacy must create
guarantees for implementation of his central idea: a permanent peaceful life as a basic
condition for the happiness of its people and their prosperity. Kant was basing his
doctrine on none other but constitutionalism and constitutional government. Kant had
thus formulated the main problem of constitutionalism, The constitution of a state is
eventually based on the morals of its citizens, which, in its turns, is based on the
goodness of this constitution.[citation needed] Kants idea is the foundation for the
constitutional theory of the twenty-first century.
The Rechtsstaat concept is based on the ideas, discovered by Immanuel Kant, for
example, in his Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals: The task of establishing a
universal and permanent peaceful life is not only a part of the theory of law within the
framework of pure reason, but per se an absolute and ultimate goal. To achieve this
goal, a state must become the community of a large number of people, living provided
with legislative guarantees of their property rights secured by a common constitution.
The supremacy of this constitution must be derived a priori from the considerations
for achievement of the absolute ideal in the most just and fair organization of peoples
life under the aegis of public law..[8] The concept of the Rechtsstaat appeared in the
German context in Robert von Mohl's book Die deutsche Polizeiwissenschaft nach den
Grundstzen des Rechtsstaates ("German police science according to the principles of
the constitutional state", 18321834), and was contrasted with the aristocratic police
state.

Critics of the European Union assert that the Union's relative inability to establish itself
as an influential external policy entity in the international level stems from the fact that
the EU's institutions function on Kantian premises and are therefore ill-equipped to face
the more primitive non-Kantian world outside.[citation needed]
Kant opposed "democracy" which, in that era, meant direct democracy believing
that majority rule posed a threat to individual liberty. He stated, "democracy is,
properly speaking, necessarily a despotism, because it establishes an executive power in
which "all" decide for or even against one who does not agree; that is, "all", who are not
quite all, decide, and this is a contradiction of the general will with itself and with
freedom."[9] As most writers at the time he distinguished three forms of government:
democracy, aristocracy, and monarchy with mixed government as the most ideal form of
government.
A distinctive feature of Kant's political philosophy is his conviction that the university
should be a model of creative conflict: the philosopher's role within the university
should be to "police" the higher faculties (which in his day were theology, law and
medicine), making sure their teaching conforms to the principles of reason; likewise, the
goal of perpetual peace in society can be achieved only when the rulers consult with
philosophers on a regular basis.[10]